Every 40 Seconds
by hxchick
Summary: An offshoot from A Different Kind of Life: Hotch's daughter is kidnapped and Hotch and the team must try to get her back and help her through her physical and emotional recovery. Chapter 6 rated M for violence and attempted rape. AU. Hotch/OC.
1. Chapter 1

_*Beep* *Beep* *Beep* *Beep* _Jane's alarm clock rudely woke her from a sound sleep. 'Ugh! It is _way_ too early to get up' she thought as she hit the snooze button. It was the third week into Jane's senior year of high school and while she should have been full of youthful energy, her dad had recently given her more leeway into choosing her own bedtime and as a result she had stayed up very late the night before. She gave serious thought to skipping her morning run, but finally decided to get up. She quickly changed into her running clothes, put a baseball cap on over her short, bobbed hair and made her way downstairs.

Her father was already in the kitchen eating his breakfast. He had a meeting with some unit chiefs from other departments that morning and he wanted to get to the office early to prepare for it. He looked up from his cereal as she came into the room.

"Morning Sweetie, did you sleep well?"

"Pretty well, although the thunder woke me up a few times. You?" She asked him as she grabbed a granola bar and some juice.

"Not bad, but the storm woke me up too. Going for your morning run?" Jane had started her morning run when she was a freshman in high school. Hotch knew it helped her clear her head before school in the mornings and he encouraged it, he even ran with her a few times per week.

"Yup." She responded, finishing her juice. "I'm going to be home late tonight, probably not until 700pm. I have track practice and then I have to go to the library to research a paper that I have due later this semester."

"That's fine." Hotch responded, putting his empty bowl in the sink. "I'll hold dinner for you. I've got to get going, I need to do some prep work for my meeting. Have a good day at school."

"You have a good day at work. Stay safe." She said this to him every morning; she worried about him getting hurt while on duty.

"I will. Love you."

"Love you too, dad." Jane said as Hotch left for work. Jane finished her granola bar and left for her run.

**********

Jane loved running in the morning, it gave her a chance to think without any distractions. As she ran her two miles she thought about the fun she would have during her senior year of high school. She thought about her boyfriend Andy and the plans they had this weekend and she thought about what colleges she would apply to for the next year.

Jane was still deep in thought when she reached the back door of her house. While she was unlocking the door, she was mentally debating the advantages and disadvantages of going to an out of state college when she felt someone grab her upper right arm. She took a deep breath to scream when she felt a cloth over her face. She struggled for another twenty seconds before the chloroform took effect and she passed out.

**********

After his meeting Hotch was talking with Dave in the hallway between their offices when he heard his desk phone ring. Dave followed him as he went to answer the phone.

"Agent Hotchner."

"Mr. Hotchner, this is Pam Johnson calling from St. Andrews Academy."

Hutch's eyebrows furrowed, that was Jane's school. "What can I do for you, Ms. Johnson?"

"Mr. Hotchner, Jane did not show up for school today, did you forget to call and tell us she is sick?"

Hotch felt his blood pressure rise. "No, she's not sick; I'm not sure what's going on. I will check into this and get back to you Ms. Johnson. Thank you for letting me know."

"Thank you Mr. Hotchner."

Hotch ended the call and immediately dialed Jane's cell phone…it went straight to voicemail.

"Damn." Hotch said, hanging up his phone.

"What's going on Hotch?" Dave asked him, concerned.

"Jane didn't show up for school today. I hope she didn't decide to skip."

Dave thought for a minute. "That's never happened before, has it?"

"No and it better not be happening now!" Hotch replied, picking up his car keys. "I have an hour before my next meeting; I'm going home to see if she's there, she might be sick or something."

"Do you want me to come with you?" Dave asked. Something didn't feel right about this situation.

"No, it won't take me long." Hotch said and then left for the parking garage.

**********

When Hotch got to his house twenty minutes later, the first thing he noticed was that Jane's car was still in the garage. 'She probably got sick and forgot to call me.' Hotch thought as he parked on the street in front of the house. He let himself in the front door, called her name and got no response. He went upstairs to Jane's room and saw that while she wasn't there, her purse was. Hotch started to get a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. He went downstairs and looked all around and found no sign of her. Finally he went into the kitchen and noticed that the back door was ajar. He cautiously approached the door, opened it and found Jane's key in the lock and her IPod laying on the ground. He also saw two sets of muddy footprints near the door. One set was large, the other was smaller. He could tell by the footprints that the larger person dragged the smaller person to the end of the driveway where the footprints disappeared.

Fighting the rising feeling of panic, Hotch dialed Dave's number. "Dave, get the team to my house right away. Something's happened."

**********

_This is an offshoot of my first story 'A Different Kind of Life.' It takes place in the same AU and Hotch and Jane have had all of the experiences I've written about there (up until Jane turned 17). If you haven't read that story, you may want to read it first._

_It is mid-September in this story and Jane is 17 years old._

_This is my first foray into a multi-chapter story so please be patient. The title comes from a statistic that says that in the US a child is reported missing every 40 seconds._

_Reviews are always welcomed.  
_


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 2

* * *

Dave hung up with Hotch and dashed out of his office. "BAU team, you're with me! Let's move!" He made his way towards Garcia's office and barged in, startling the tech. "Garcia, we need you with us, NOW!"

Garcia got up and followed Dave to the elevators where the rest of the team was already waiting. Once they got inside and started the ride down to the motor pool, Dave started explaining the situation.

"We're going to Hotch's house. He got a call earlier today from Jane's school; she didn't show up today. He went home to check and see if she was sick and the next thing I knew he was calling me to tell me to get the rest of the team over there. He thinks something has happened to her."

"Oh god!" Garcia said with a sob.

They got to the motor pool, got their SUV's and headed towards the Hotchner house.

**********

Hotch looked around the area by the back door. He didn't see signs of a struggle, but he knew the drag marks were a bad sign. He knew he could possibly be over reacting, but his gut told him something was very wrong. He started praying to a god that he hadn't talked to in a while that his daughter was OK.

He looked up as he saw his team come the driveway. "Thanks for coming guys, something is definitely wrong here."

The rest of the team stared at him for a minute, he looked like he was on the edge of hysteria, but he was trying to keep it together.

"Show us what you found, Hotch." Derek said.

Hotch showed them the key in the door, the IPod and the drag marks. The team started looking around the back door for a few minutes.

"I've found something!" Emily yelled as the rest of the team surrounded her. She held up a cloth, "I think there's chloroform on it." She said softly.

Hotch could feel the little bit of hope leave him. Chloroform…that was concrete evidence that she was taken.

"What does that _mean_?" Garcia asked, a little hysterically.

Derek put his arm around her. "It means that Jane was most likely taken, Babygirl."

Dave wanted bury his head in his hands, but he knew that with Aaron as the father of the victim, he would need to take the lead in the investigation. He led the team inside the house. "Ok, I want crime scene techs here ASAP, I want an Amber alert out on Jane and I want her picture on every news station in the next half-hour. I want-" Dave was cut off by the ringing of Hotch's cell phone.

"That's Jane's ringtone!" Hotch yelled, answering the phone. "Jane sweetie, are you-" He was interrupted by a low chuckle.

"Agent Hotchner, how nice it is to talk to you again."

"Who is this? Why do you have my daughter's phone?" Hotch demanded, switching the phone to speaker phone so the rest of the team could hear it.

"I'm hurt, Agent Hotchner. I would think you would recognize my voice. After all, you did help imprison me for twelve years. Twelve long and dreary years. Prison is a terrible place, Agent Hotchner, the only thing that helped was talking to my daughter once a week…that is until she told me some of the things that were happening to her in foster care. You see Agent Hotchner, I was a single father so when I went to prison my ten year old daughter was put in the system. She used to tell me about the abuse that took place in the homes, abuse so horrible that she could barely speak about it. Physical abuse…and sexual abuse…and every time she called me she would beg me to help her, to get her out of the system, to protect her and I couldn't. I couldn't protect my daughter thanks to you!" The unsub was really yelling now. "When she was sixteen, she decided to get out of the system in her own way…she killed herself. You helped those bastards! You helped those bastards take my daughter's innocence and you helped take her life, so I've decided to take your daughter. I've decided to let you feel the anguish of being utterly powerless while knowing that your daughter is being hurt, and you can bet that I will hurt her in every way I know how. I hope it eats away at you, I hope it slowly drives you insane, you son of a bitch!" The unsub ended the call.

"Oh my god." Hotch whispered, collapsing into a kitchen chair. Some psycho was going to hurt his baby and it was all his fault.

Everyone stood in shock for a minute. Finally Spencer broke the silence, "We need to look in Jane's room for any clues as to who this may be. She might have seen him following her. Does she keep a diary Hotch?"

"She does," he said faintly. "It's on her bookshelf, she disguised it as a regular book so no one would see what it was. I think it has a _Shopaholic_ book cover on it or something…she knows I wouldn't read that type of book."

"Prentiss and Reid, go up to her room and look around for any clues and get her diary. Morgan, it looks like the crime scene techs are here, show them around outside and give them a hand. JJ, get a picture of Jane from the living room and get it out over the wires and then have the Amber alert issued. I'll stay and direct things here in the house."

The team scattered to their various positions. Penelope and Hotch just sat in the kitchen, both in a daze.

"Garcia…Garcia…_Penelope_!" Dave said loudly.

Penelope shook herself out of her trance. "Sorry sir, what do you need me to do? I know she has a blog, I will go log into it and see if she has had any weirdo comments. I can also hack her email and facebook account and look at her digital footprint. Then I can-" Dave interrupted her.

"Actually, what I need Garcia is the name of another tech that can help us with this case."

Garcia looked confused. "Sir, I don't understand."

Dave took a deep breath, he knew what he was about to say would be unpopular with two people sitting in front of him. "I don't think you or Aaron should be on this case, you both are too close to Jane."

Both of them jumped to their feet and Hotch started shouting.

"That's my goddamn daughter out there, Dave! Do you really think I'm going to sit here and do nothing? Jesus Christ! That would really make me helpless. If I don't do something to help, I will go out of my fucking skull!

"Aaron, you are way too close to this to be effective, let us do our jobs." Dave told him.

"Don't! Don't talk to me like the family of a victim, Dave."

"Look at it from my point of view Hotch, you can't-" Dave was interrupted by a feminine voice.

"Agent Rossi?" Garcia said softly, but determinedly. "With all due respect sir, you are out of your fucking mind if you think we are going to sit on the sidelines for this one. I don't care that you think we are too close to Jane to be effective, we are staying on the case. If you try to take us off of it, you will find yourself penniless and homeless in about fifteen minutes. Don't forget, it only takes a few seconds in cyberspace to destroy an empire."

Dave was shocked. He had never heard the tech speak to anyone like that. He put himself in their shoes, which he was practically in since he was also very close to his goddaughter.

"Fine! You can both stay on the case, but I want you back at the BAU. Garcia, run a search on recent parolees who did twelve years in prison and who also had a sixteen year old daughter that died. You can also look at Jane's digital footprint to see if you can find anything."

"Rossi." The rest of the team was in the kitchen. "The crime scene techs are kicking us out. We got Jane's diary and laptop and we looked around her room for anything that might be helpful, but now we've got to get out of here." Morgan told him.

"Ok, let's get back to headquarters." Dave ordered. As he made his way back to the SUV, he dialed Gideon's number, he knew they would need help on this case.

**********

The first thing Jane felt when she woke up was disorientation. She knew she wasn't in her own bed, but she wasn't sure where she was. She cracked open her eyes and looked around. Suddenly everything from the morning came rushing back to her; the hand gripping her arm, the cloth on her mouth…'Oh my god, I've been kidnapped' she thought to herself.

She could feel herself starting to panic and she tried to calm down. She looked around the room, it looked like a basement; there were no windows and it had cement walls and a cement floor. The light in the room came from a single bare light bulb attached to the ceiling. It was also damp and cool in the room. She was on a bare mattress on the floor, there were no sheets or blankets which sucked since she was freezing. She looked down at herself and saw that she was still wearing her running clothes which consisted of only a tank top, running shorts, shoes and socks.

She looked up and saw a small security camera in the corner of the room. She knew then that whoever had taken her was also watching her. It was too high up for her to pull it down.

Jane was scared. She knew from the few cases that her dad had talked about that there was a good chance she would die in this room, the statistics on stranger abductions were not good. She decided right then and there that she would not make it easy for the kidnapper, she had trained with Derek for years and she would go down fighting. If she was going to die, she was going to die on her feet.

Jane looked up as the door opened and her kidnapper walked into the room.

**********

Back at the BAU, the team was immersed in the investigation and Hotch was in his office giving various statements and descriptions to whomever needed them. Dave was in his office talking with Erin Strauss, who had pledged her full support to the investigation. She let Dave know that anything they needed, they would get.

Strauss was also shaken by the kidnapping. While she wasn't as close to Jane as Dave and Penelope were, she considered Jane to be a friend and vice versa. Jane had stayed with Erin a dozen times over the last five years and the two had bonded.

After Strauss left, Dave started reviewing the case. He was deep in thought when his phone rang and startled him.

"Sir, you need to get the rest of the team except for Hotch down to my office immediately." Garcia told him. "We got something from the unsub."

**********

_I am not good at writing the actual cases and investigations so this chapter might not be the best…I promise it will get better. _

_I have a bunch of papers due over the next two weeks so updates might not come regularly for this story, but once November comes and things settle down, I will be updating more frequently._


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 3

* * *

Dave hung up with Garcia and made his way to her office. He wasn't going to have the rest of the team come until he knew what she had because he knew that all of them leaving at the same time would rouse Hotch's curiosity and he would follow.

As he was walking towards her office, Dave saw Jason Gideon step off of the elevator. For the past couple of years Jason had been a consultant for the BAU. He didn't want to return to work full-time, but he found he missed profiling, he usually assisted them when they were short handed or on especially difficult cases. Dave knew that this case fell into the 'difficult case' category.

Dave met up with Jason. "Thanks for coming Jason; I have a feeling we're going to need all the help we can get on this one."

"God Dave, of course I'm going to help out. How's Hotch?" Gideon asked him.

"He's doing about as well as can be expected. I tried taking both him and Garcia off the case and I thought they were going to rip me apart."

"What did you expect? This is Hotch's worst fear come true, and Penelope loves Jane like she's her own child." Gideon told him.

They arrived at Penelope's office to find her staring at her computer screen, hyperventilating.

"What do you have, Garcia?" David asked, concerned.

She looked at him and Gideon. "I received an email with a link attached. The link led me here." She brought up the website on one of her computers; it was a live webcam feed.

"Is that…" Jason trailed off.

"It's Jane, sir. This is a live webcam feed we're watching, and before you ask, I can't trace it. The unsub has it set up to reroute its signal through another server every 30 seconds. Whoever this is knows his computers."

Dave reached for his cell phone. "Prentiss get Morgan, JJ and Reid to Garcia's office now, but for god's sake, DON'T let Hotch know; he can't be here right now!" Dave snapped his phone shut. He, Jason and Garcia just stared at the screen in silence.

The rest of the team, minus Hotch, arrived in less than a minute. "Oh my god!" Prentiss exclaimed when she saw the computer screen. "Is that Jane?"

"It is, this is a live webcam and no, I can't trace its location." Garcia said, shakily.

Everyone stared at the screen for a minute. "At least it looks like he hasn't hurt her." Reid said.

"Yet, he hasn't hurt her yet. He told Hotch he was going to hurt her." Emily pointed out.

As if reading her mind, the kidnapper walked into Jane's room.

**********

As soon as her kidnapper walked into the room, Jane got to her feet and tried to push her fear down so it was not evident on her face. The man walked up to Jane and stood toe to toe with her, staring into her eyes. Suddenly, he backhanded her across the left side of her face and she fell across her bed.

The pain from the blow was almost overwhelming for Jane. Pain immediately shot from her face up to her scalp and down to her neck and she could feel her nose start to bleed. Shakily, she got up from the bed and stood and faced him again.

"I'm not afraid of you." She said, hoping she sounded braver than she felt.

"You're not afraid of me?" He asked, mockingly.

"No, I don't fear cowards." As soon as she said the words, he backhanded her again, this time much harder. Jane thought she heard a crack come from her nose and it started bleeding much more heavily. She made herself stand up again. As soon as she did, he kneed her in the stomach, and she fell to the ground.

"Did your father teach you not to fear cowards?" He asked her nastily.

Jane was on the floor, working on regaining her breath. "My father?" She gasped, confused.

"Yes your father. I'll bet you think he is a great man, I'll bet you think he is out there putting monsters away while saving the world. Let me tell you what your father did." The volume of his voice increased as he went on. "Your father let an innocent girl be abused and violated for six years. Your father is the reason my daughter killed herself when she was sixteen. You might think I'm a monster, but your father is every bit as much of one as I am, maybe more because I've never tried to make people think that the horrible things I've done are noble, yet your father walks around like he is a fucking hero trying to save the world!" He finished his rant with a savage kick to Jane's upper thigh.

"Let me tell you something Sweetie…isn't that what your dad calls you? Sweetie? Let me tell you something Sweetie, what you've felt here is just a preview of things to come. You will feel everything my poor Annie felt, _all_ of the abuses, and at the end you will die just the same way she did and I hope it drives your bastard of a father insane!" He raged.

Jane listened to the kidnapper's rant and by the end she had regained enough of her breath to lash out. She kicked her foot out, trying to knock him down so she could get away, but he stepped out of the path of her foot and kicked her in the ribs.

"Nice try, _Sweetie_, but I think you will find I'm not that easy to take down. Maybe you should work a little more on being scared." With that the kidnapper left the room.

As soon as he left the room, Jane let loose the tears that had been threatening to flow. She hadn't wanted to give him the satisfaction of crying in front of him. She knew that he could see her via the camera in the corner of the room, but she couldn't hold the tears back any longer, she was in pain! Her face and stomach were the worst and her nose was still bleeding. She couldn't believe that this psycho was going to torture and kill her! She knew he was serious about it because he didn't bother covering up his face, which meant he wasn't worried about her identifying him later on. She prayed that her father and the team would find her fast.

**********

The team stared at the screen, horrified by what they had just seen and heard. After the unsub left the room, they stood in silence for a few minutes just watching Jane as she cried and tried to recover from her beating. A beep from one of Garcia's computers finally broke the silence.

"I have a name," she told the group. She started running facial recognition software the moment the unsub got on camera. "Anthony Sampson. He did twelve years for drug trafficking and money laundering. He was a computer programmer, which explains how he is able to re-route his IP address."

Dave spoke up. "Ok everyone, I want Prentiss and Morgan to check out Sampson's last known address. I know it's a long shot, but maybe we can find something out about him and where he's keeping Jane. Gideon and Reid, go talk to Jane's friends, maybe one of them remembers seeing Sampson and will have some helpful information. Garcia, you stay here and monitor the video feed, I want everything recorded" He paused. "This goes without saying, but Hotch cannot know about this camera feed. He's barely hanging on as it is and this would push him over the edge, it's every parent's worst nightmare."

Everyone thought about that for a moment. Dave was right, Hotch would lose it if he ever saw this. The team started filing out of Garcia's office.

"JJ, stick around for a minute." Dave said to her.

"What can I do, Dave?" She asked him.

"I know this guy is focused on Jane right now, but any kids of our team are at risk. I would like you to consider bringing Henry and Will here until we catch this guy. That way we can all be sure that he won't get anyone else. I can have a dorm in the academy set up for them if you would like." He told her.

"That would be great Dave," JJ said in relief. "I've been worried about them."

"Go home and get them, I'll have a room ready for them by the time you get back. Also, will you let the rest of the team know that I'm having a room set up for us at the academy as well? I doubt anyone will be leaving until this case is solved one way or another, but I don't want a team of sleep deprived zombies. This way we'll have a couple of beds available."

"I will spread the word to the rest of the team," JJ promised. "And Dave? Thanks again." With that JJ left to go get her family.

Dave turned to Garcia. "How are you holding up, Penelope?" He asked her.

"I can't do this Dave, I think you were right, you should get another tech on this case." Garcia said, shakily.

"I would love to Garcia, but the situation has changed and right now you are the best person for the job. We need you to monitor what's happening with Jane and you're our best chance of tracing the signal and finding this SOB." Dave said, somewhat apologetically.

"I don't think you understand sir," Garcia said, a little hysterically. "I had to do this once before when Reid was kidnapped by Henkel. I had to watch while he beat, killed and revived him. I lost a piece of myself during that case and I had to fight like hell to get it back. If I have to watch this guy hurt Jane I will lose more than a piece of myself and I don't think I will ever get it back. Jane is the closest thing to a daughter that I have."

Dave hated himself for it, but he had to keep her on this case. "I get that Garcia, she's the closest thing to a daughter that I'll ever have as well," he said sadly, "and I'm sorry you have to go through this, but we need you, _Jane _needs you. I promise after this is over I will do whatever I can to help you regain that piece of yourself, but right now you have to stay on this case, for Jane _and_ for Aaron. If Jane dies I don't think Aaron will ever be the same."

Garcia gave a watery sigh. "You're right sir, they both need me. I'll stay on the case and watch every horrible thing he does to her."

"If it's any consolation, you won't be alone." Dave tried to reassure her. "I'll be down here watching with you whenever I can, and when I'm not here someone else will be here with you. Since the rest of the team is gone, I'm going to call Kevin and have him sit with you since I have to talk to Hotch. When I'm done, I'll be back down. We'll get through this together, OK?"

"OK Dave…and…thanks." Garcia responded.

"Thank _you_ Penelope." He said softly. "Call me if he comes back into her room."

Dave left her office, calling Kevin on the way to his own office. Garcia turned back to the monitor and watched as her goddaughter tried to get her crying under control.

"Stay strong Jane." She whispered, touching the screen.

**********

_I am not a computer savvy person, so I have no idea if all of the computer stuff in here is accurate, I hope it is._

_Reviews are appreciated; it lets me know there are people out there reading my stories!_


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

After leaving Garcia's office, Dave made his way towards Aaron's. When he got there, he stood in the doorway and observed the man for a minute. It had been less than twelve hours since Sampson had called him and he looked like he had aged ten years. His eyes were bloodshot, there was a stoop to his shoulders that hadn't been there yesterday and there was a bit of a wild look in his eyes. This was killing him and Dave was afraid that if they didn't get Jane back alive they would lose him completely.

Dave knocked on the door frame so he wouldn't startle Hotch. "How are you holding up?" He asked him.

"I'm going through my files trying to figure out who this asshole is. Do you know how many files I have?" Hotch asked him.

"A lot, I'm sure," Dave replied. "Does the name Anthony Sampson mean anything to you?"

Hotch thought for a minute. "He was one of my last cases as a prosecutor. I was just starting at the FBI but I was also finishing up a few cases I had left to prosecute. Do you think he's the unsub?"

"Yeah, I do. It fits with what he told us; he was in prison for twelve years and he had a sixteen year old daughter who killed herself. He was also paroled three months ago." Dave told him, leaving out the fact that Garcia had identified him using the facial recognition software.

Hotch looked at him suspiciously, "How did you find all of this out? I thought Garcia couldn't find anything when she searched."

"Hey, when Garcia finds something, I don't ask questions about how she did it. Do you want to know how she does half of the stuff she does?" Dave asked him.

A ghost of a smile passed over Hotch's lips. "No, if I don't know about it then I can't be implicated." He thought for a minute. "It can't be Sampson. He went away for running the computers behind a drug trafficking and money laundering ring. It was a non-violent crime and he plead down to the twelve years, I offered it to him _specifically _because there wasn't anything in his background that indicated violence."

"What can I tell you Hotch? Knowing about his daughter's abuse coupled with her suicide is a pretty big stressor." Dave replied, hoping that Hotch would drop it before he had to tell him about the facial recognition.

"Yeah, but-" Hotch was interrupted by a junior agent at his office door.

"I'm sorry to interrupt sirs," he said to the two senior agents, "but Agent Hotchner has a couple of young visitors at the front desk; an Andrew Fisher and Melody Ventner."

'This isn't going to be fun,' Hotch thought to himself. Andy was Jane's boyfriend and Melody was Jane's best friend. He knew they were going to be upset and have questions for him.

"Have someone bring them up here please." Hotch told the junior agent.

"I'll head back to my office and let you talk to the kids." Dave said, turning to leave.

"Actually Dave, would you stay? You may be able to answer questions that I can't." Hotch asked.

"No problem." Dave said as the two kids got to Hotch's office.

"Mel, Andy, please come in." Hotch said, inviting them into his office. Hotch had known Melody Ventner since she moved in next door to them when she was five years old. It took her and Jane all of one day to form an instant and binding friendship and from then on Mel had been a fixture in the Hotchner household, just as Jane was a fixture in the Ventner household. Andy was a different story. Jane and Andy started out as friends, but they had been dating exclusively for almost a year. Hotch didn't want to like Andy, for obvious reasons, but he made Jane happy and he was basically a good kid so he was nice to him.

Andy and Mel had never been to the BAU headquarters before so they were a little nervous. They stepped stiffly inside Hotch's office and sat down on the sofa, while Hotch and Rossi pulled chairs over for themselves. "Agent Hotchner, can you tell us what's going on?" Mel asked, sounding a little bit frantic.

"What do the two of you know so far?" Hotch asked them.

"Not much, we know Jane didn't show up for school and then the cops and some FBI agents came and asked us a bunch of questions." Andy told him.

"And then when I got home from school today, I saw the crime scene vans at your house and the yellow police tape by your kitchen door. Is Jane OK?" Mel asked Hotch, with tears in her voice.

Hotch sighed. "No, she's not," and then Hotch couldn't continue. He knew if he had to explain the kidnapping to Jane's friends, he would break down completely.

Thankfully, Dave saw that Aaron was having trouble so he gave the two kids a brief rundown on what was happening with Jane. He left out the parts about the webcam and that it was an unsub looking for revenge.

Mel started quietly crying while Dave was talking, while Andy had a look of shock on his face. When Dave was done there was a moment of silence and then Andy spoke up.

"This makes no sense, who would want to kidnap Jane? Everyone likes her." Andy said angrily. He was pissed that someone dared to take his girlfriend.

"Dave left out part of the story. The kidnapper is someone I helped put in prison about twelve years ago. He took Jane as revenge, to make me suffer. This is all my fault." Aaron choked up on the last word, trying desperately to keep control of his emotions.

Dave stood up. "Look, it's almost seven o'clock, why don't you two head home? This is going to drag out for most of the night and as much as I know you're worried about Jane, we really can't have you in here while we are running the investigation."

The other three stood up as well. "Ok sir, we will head out, but please keep us updated." Andy almost begged him.

"I promise we will let you know if we find anything-" Dave paused and took a deep breath, "either good or bad."

The two headed for the door when Mel stopped and turned around. "Agent Hotchner?"

Hotch smiled softly. "Mel, I've known you since you were five years old, hell you probably spend more time at our house than you do your own. Please call me either Aaron or Hotch."

Mel gave a little sheepish smile. "Ok, Aaron? Please don't blame yourself for this, Jane wouldn't want you to. She is so proud of the work that you do, you should hear the pride in her voice when she talks about your job. I'm sure wherever she is, she is not blaming you and she would be pissed if she thought you were blaming yourself." Mel paused for a minute so she could get her emotions under control and not cry. "I am saying all of this as a favor to you. When you get her back, and I am _sure_ you will get her back, if she knows that you've been feeling guilty about this she will kick your ass and you know it."

A few tears escaped from Hotch's eyes. "Thanks Mel, I needed to hear that." He said quietly.

"Any time, sir." She said as she kissed his cheek goodbye.

After Andy and Mel left, Hotch spent a minute getting his emotions in check. Once he did, he turned to Dave. "I want a copy of Jane's diary to read, maybe I can help figure out where she is."

Dave wondered if that was a good idea. If they got Jane back alive, it was going to be a big blow to her privacy to know that the entire team, including her father, had read her diary. On the other hand, if they didn't find out where Sampson was keeping her she would probably die. Plus Dave knew that Hotch needed this connection with his daughter right now.

"Ok, Hotch, I'll have a copy brought up. The book diary only goes back a year, but there are diaries that go back to when she was eleven on her laptop. It looks like once she fills a diary, she scans all of the pages into her hard drive." Dave was impressed by Jane's record keeping.

"Is Garcia done with her laptop?" Hotch asked.

"I think so, why?"

"I would like to have Jane's laptop here to look through. I know she keeps all of her pictures on it and…I just need that connection with her right now." Hotch told him.

Dave's face softened. "I'll check with Garcia and see if she's done with it and if she is I'll have her bring it to you."

"Thanks Dave."

***

Twenty minutes later Garcia entered Hotch's office carrying Jane's bright pink laptop. "Here you go sir. I haven't found anything that might help us, but you'll have a different insight into her."

Hotch studied Garcia, she looked like she had aged ten years and all of the joy and sparkle was gone from her face.

"Thanks Garcia, I could have come down to your office to get this." Hotch told her.

"No!" She said quickly and then realized her mistake. "I mean...its ok, I wanted a change of scenery anyway…this got me out of my office."

Hotch looked at her sharply, all of his profiling instincts kicking in. "Why do you need a change of scenery, Penelope? What does Dave have you doing in your office?"

"Umm, nothing sir, really…just looking through files and monitoring the internet." She told him, not meeting his eyes.

"And have you found anything online?" He asked her sternly.

"Not really." Her cell phone rang, it was Dave. He had heard their exchange from his office and was calling her to get her out of there. "Sorry sir, I have to go." Penelope said as she rushed out of his office.

Hotch made a mental note to question her further the next time he saw her and then he turned his attention to Jane's laptop.

***

Hotch finally looked up from Jane's laptop at around ten o'clock that night. He had read a year's worth of diaries and he had looked through her pictures. He looked up from it only because he needed to rest his eyes.

He looked around the BAU. He saw that Spencer, Emily, Derek and JJ were all in the conference room, still working on the case. God only knew where Jason and Dave were. He was about to go to the conference room to tell them all to go home and get some sleep when his cell phone rang.

"Hotchner."

"Agent Hotchner, did you like the first act?"

"Who is this?" Hotch asked, with an uneasy feeling in his stomach. He shot Garcia an instant message on his computer telling her to try and trace this call.

"You know exactly who this is, I'm looking at your daughter right now." Sampson said.

Hotch didn't want to let Sampson know that they knew who he was. "Whoever this is, just let Jane go, don't let this drag out. You will be in less trouble if you let her go now."

"Please Agent Hotchner, don't pretend you don't know who this is. I'm sure that your tech ran facial recognition software as soon as I popped up on the screen."

"What are you talking about, what screen?" Hotch asked.

Sampson could tell that Hotch was genuinely confused. "Oh that is just perfect." He said softly, with a sadistic laugh. "She didn't tell you."

"Tell me what?" Hotch said, getting angry.

"I suggest you go have a talk with your technical analyst, and I suggest you do it soon; act two is about to begin." Sampson said, disconnecting the call.

Hotch stood and stared at his dead phone. 'What the hell is going on?' He wondered to himself as he made his way towards Garcia's office.

***

Garcia was in her office, sipping a cup of tea and talking to Erin Strauss while watching Jane on the screen. She had been surprised when Strauss offered to sit with her and watch Jane, but Garcia realized that Strauss and Jane had their own bond. Garcia got along better with Strauss than she thought she would, but that was mostly because they were both worried about the same person.

She heard her office door open and was about to turn around to see who had entered when she heard Hotch shout "What the FUCK is going on here?!"

**

_This was actually going to be one really long chapter, but I've decided to split them up. Chapter 5 will be up later tonight or tomorrow._

_Reviews? Please?_


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 2

* * *

"Is that JANE?" Hotch shouted, not believing what he was seeing on Garcia's computer screen.

Garcia looked panicked. "It _is_ Jane sir, I-"

"Is this live? Are we watching her live right now?!" He asked, not believing his eyes.

"Um, yes…Hotch we-" Garcia tried explaining but didn't get far.

"WHY IN THE HELL DIDN'T YOU TELL ME ABOUT THIS?!" Hotch roared at her.

Both Garcia and Strauss were taken aback by the intensity and anger radiating off of Hotch.

"Sir...I…I…" Garcia was stammering, she didn't want to put the blame on Dave, but she couldn't stand being yelled at.

"I ordered her not to tell you about it," Dave said calmly from the doorway. He and Jason were standing there with bags of Chinese food in their hands. They had gone out for a late night take-out run and had returned in time to hear Hotch screaming at Garcia.

Hotch whipped around to look at Dave. "You did WHAT?! Who in the HELL are you to order her to do ANYTHING? The last time I checked _I_ am still the Unit Chief of this team and _I_ give the orders here, NOT you!"

Hotch's shouting was loud enough that it brought the rest of the team to Garcia's office. They stood there in shock while Hotch yelled at one of his closest friends. They all knew he was on the verge of losing it.

"What was I supposed to do, Hotch? Invite you in to watch while your daughter was being beaten? I was doing this to protect you! It was hard enough for me to watch and she's not my kid!" Dave was starting to lose his patience with Hotch.

"Godammit Dave, that wasn't your call to make! I should have been told about this. My god, it can't be any worse than what I've been imagining all day! I'm the goddamn Unit Chief and she's my daughter!"

"THAT'S IT!" Dave bellowed. "I want you off of this case and I want you out of the building! We will keep you updated, but you need to GO HOME!"

"FUCK YOU DAVE! You are _crazy_ if you think I'm going home! It will take a fucking fire to get me to leave this building!"

Dave took a deep breath and tried to calm down. He knew he would not be able to get through to his friend, so he needed a different approach. He turned to Strauss.

"Erin, you're his superior, order him off of this case and tell him to go home." He could see that Strauss was trying to make a decision and he decided to push a little harder. "You know I'm right about this, you _know _I am! Put aside your dislike for me and make the right choice."

The entire office went silent as Strauss weighed the options. Finally she shook her head. "I can't order Agent Hotchner to go home, David. If this was one of my kids I would want to, no, I would _need_ to be here."

"Godammit Erin! You're letting your emotions cloud your judgment! You are also too close to Jane to be objective, you are thinking like a mother, not a Section Chief!" Dave exploded.

"Watch yourself David," Strauss told him. "I know it's been a long day, but I will only tolerate so much insubordination from you. I will not order Agent Hotchner to go home but he will not be in charge of this case. David, you will lead this case and you will use Aaron's skills as necessary and you _will _keep him apprised of any new developments in the case; good or bad. Understood?"

Dave glared at her. "Understood," he replied. "I'm taking orders from the craziest person in the crazy house…keeping people here…not listening…goddamn clusterfuck…" Dave was muttering under his breath.

Hotch took a deep breath and turned back to Garcia. "So this is a live webcam?"

"Yes sir, but I can't trace it." She said timidly.

"When did you get the feed?" He asked her.

"Early this afternoon, the link was sent to me in an email." She told him.

Hotch closed his eyes for a moment. "Can you tell if anyone else is watching it?"

"I've been monitoring the site and it hasn't gotten any hits other than from our team and it doesn't show up on any search engines." She replied.

'Thank god for that,' Hotch thought. He turned around and watched the screen. "It looks like she's hurt, do you know what happened?"

No one answered for a minute and then Gideon spoke up. "He beat her this afternoon."

"How badly?" Hotch asked, not sure if he wanted to know the answer.

"I've seen worse," Jason responded, "and so far it's only been the one time."

Just as Jason got his words out, the door to Jane's room opened.

**********

Jane was lying on the bed trying to sleep, but it was impossible. The bare light bulb was always on which not only made it hard for her to sleep, but it made it impossible for her to gauge how long she had been there. It felt like she had been in that basement for a week, but she knew it couldn't have been longer than a day.

The pain was also not helping her insomnia. Her nose was killing her and her stomach ached so bad it felt like she had the flu. She was also thirsty as she hadn't had anything to drink since her juice at breakfast that morning. She felt like she would sell her soul for a glass of water.

She heard her door open and she tensed, but she didn't get off of the bed like before.

Her kidnapper walked into the room. "How are you doing Sweetie?" He asked her mockingly.

Jane didn't say anything, she just stayed on the bed with her eyes closed.

"I know you're awake, I could see you on the camera." He said as he approached her bed. He still got no response from her. "I guess I'll have to wake you up." He said standing next to her bed.

That was what Jane was waiting for. As soon as he got to her bed, she shot her foot up and kicked him as hard as she could in the groin. He went down and Jane leapt from the bed, stopping only to kick him in the stomach. She then ran for the door, but Sampson recovered more quickly than she thought he would and he got up and chased her. He grabbed her and they scuffled for a minute until Sampson brought a gun out of his back waistband and fired, grazing Jane's left arm. This stopped her fighting.

Sampson dragged Jane by her injured arm and threw her down on the bed. Jane immediately turned over on to her back and tried to get up, but she was stopped by Sampson. He put the barrel of his gun on her forehead, right between her eyes. "Are you worth a bullet, bitch?" He asked her roughly.

Jane couldn't breathe. "ARE YOU?" Sampson asked again.

"No." Jane whispered, her life flashing in front of her eyes. She could see that her kidnapper was deciding whether to kill her or not. She didn't move, not even to breathe.

"No, you're not." He said after a minute, slowly lowering the gun. He put the gun back in his waistband and pulled Jane to her feet.

Slamming her into the cinderblock wall he told her, "You _are_ going to die bitch, but it's not going to be quick like a gunshot. By the end you will be begging me to kill you." With that he slammed her to the floor, where Jane hit her head.

"Get up off the floor, Sweetie." Sampson told her. He loved using her father's term of endearment on her, it was part of the psychological abuse.

Jane didn't move, she was in a daze.

"I _said_, get up." Sampson kicked her in the back of her head.

Jane almost passed out, both from the pain and from the head trauma. Slowly she got to her knees and pulled herself up onto the bed.

Sampson stared at her for a minute and abruptly left the room.

Once he left, Jane started shaking. She couldn't believe how close she came to dying just now. He had actually taken a gun and put it to her head…Jane started gagging, but knew it not help things if she threw up. She started crying instead.

Her tears stopped when she heard the door open again. She sat up and saw that he was holding shackle. He shackled one cuff to a metal bar on the headboard of the bed and the other cuff to her right wrist. There was about four feet of chain between the two cuffs.

"What…what are you d-doing?" Jane stammered.

"Well I obviously can't trust you enough not to try and escape again, so I have to keep you here somehow. You should be thanking me for not just breaking your leg." Sampson told her.

"Yeah, thanks for the nose job too." Jane said sarcastically, not able to stop herself.

Sampson grinned at her for a minute and then hit her in the face, catching part of her mouth. "You've got to watch that smart mouth of yours, Sweetie. It might get you into trouble someday."

"Fuck you!" Jane said, spitting out blood.

"Don't worry, Sweetie, we _will_ fuck." Sampson said, hitting her again. He then turned and walked across the room towards the camera, unzipping his pants as he walked.

He looked directly into the camera and said softly, "I thought about leaving the camera on so you could watch this part, Agent Hotchner, but what you will imagine will be much worse than I could ever do to your daughter. I hope it drives you crazy." With that, Sampson turned the camera off and started back towards Jane.

**********

The team, plus Strauss, watched the computer screen in horror as it went dark. They all knew what was happening to Jane at that very moment and none of them could help her. They all stood stock still for a minute until Hotch slowly sank into one of the chairs in Garcia's office. "My god," he whispered. Sampson was right, what Hotch was imagining _was_ driving him crazy.

"OK everybody," Dave said. "There's not much we can do here, so everyone needs to go back to work. If you get tired later, there is a room with three beds for us in the Academy dorm and if you're hungry, Jason and I picked up Chinese food." He handed the bags to Spencer and Derek. "We'll meet in the conference room in ten minutes for a status report." With that, most of the team, including Strauss left the room.

Dave turned back to Hotch. "How are you doing, Aaron?" Contrary to their earlier argument, Dave wasn't pissed at Aaron, he understood his need to be there for his daughter.

Hotch took a deep breath and stood up. "I'm fine Dave, what do you want me to do?"

Dave sighed. "I am going to ask you one more time to go home, Hotch."

Hotch gave him a hard look. "I appreciate your concern Dave, but if you ask me to leave again, I'm going to shoot you with my own gun."

Dave backed down. "Go back to your office and keep looking through Jane' laptop, I will let you know if we need your help anywhere else."

"Fine." Hotch replied, turning towards Penelope. "Send me the link to the webcam, Garcia. I want to keep it up on my desktop computer."

"That's a _really_ bad idea Hotch. Don't send him the link Garcia." Dave ordered.

"I don't care Dave, I want to be there when he turns the camera back on. Send me the link Garcia." Hotch told her.

"Don't you fucking send it to him!" Dave said to Garcia.

"Garcia, we've been friends for years and we both care about Jane. I _need _ to see her, even if it's like this. Send me the link." Hotch pleaded.

"Garcia, I am ordering you; don't send it." Dave said firmly.

"Dave is forgetting that he's not your Unit Chief, I am. Send it." Hotch ordered.

Garcia looked like she was watching a tennis match by the way her head was turning left and right each time Dave and Hotch gave her an order. She was torn. On one hand, Dave made a bunch of good points; on the other, Hotch was her boss and her loyalty was to him. She pulled up the link and emailed it to him.

"Godammit! That was a really stupid move Penelope!" Dave yelled at her.

"I'm sorry sir, but I've always been loyal to Hotch. He's my boss and I have to trust him." She replied.

"Thanks Garcia." Hotch said and left her office.

"I _am_ sorry Dave, but I had to send it to him. He needs to be able to see her." Garcia said to Dave, apologetically.

Dave sighed, "I understand Penelope, you've gotten close to both him and Jane. How are you holding up?" He asked her.

She gave a humorless little laugh. "I've seen better days. You?"

"The same."

They both sat in silence for a minute. "If we manage to get Jane back alive, do you think Hotch will ever be OK again?" Garcia asked him.

"I don't know if either of them will be OK again." Dave said, staring at the black computer screen.


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 6

WARNING: Attempted Rape Scene

* * *

Jane was cold, _really _cold, all she had on were her shorts and tank top and it was doing nothing to protect her from the chill of the basement room she was being held in. She was also thirsty and had developed a raspy cough from the dryness in her throat. Her injuries made it hurt to cough and the pain from various parts of her body wasn't helping anything. At this point she figured she would damn near sell her soul for a couple of Tylenol and a glass of water.

What was really getting to her though was the fear…no…the terror she was feeling. She didn't know what was going to happen to her and when it was going to happen. She had no control over anything and she hated that. Living with her father for so long, Jane had inherited his need to always be in control and this situation was scaring the shit out of her, almost as bad as the kidnapper had scared her earlier.

She really thought he was going to rape her. He had chained her to the bed, unzipped his pants and turned the camera off. She wasn't sure why he did that; maybe he didn't want evidence of that particular act if he was ever caught? Whatever the reason, Jane didn't particularly care at that moment, all she knew was that she was about to lose her virginity to some crazy psycho. It made her regret all of the times she had said no to Andy when he asked if she was ready to go all the way.

After the camera was off, he turned towards her with an almost macho swagger. He came right up to her bed and looked down at her, leering the entire time. He then got onto the bed and straddled her hips, slowly pulling down her shorts. He got them about halfway down and then abruptly stopped. He stared at her for a full minute before exploding with anger.

"FUCK!" He shouted. "I can't do this to a goddamn kid!" Sampson was fine with beating Jane, but he wasn't a pedophile, he couldn't rape her.

He yanked her shorts back up, jumped off of her and punched the wall. Then he came back to her and started to beat her. He concentrated on her upper body this time, pummeling her shoulders, chest and stomach. By the time he was done with her, he was out of breath and she was almost unconscious, but he didn't rape her.

She took a deep breath, well as deep of a breath as she could with her injuries, and tried to meditate. Emily had taught about the tranquility of meditation when she began high school and was overwhelmed at the transformation between middle school and high school. She hoped it would help her now.

**********

Hotch watched from his desktop computer as Jane tried to take deep breaths. It had been hours since the camera had come back on and he could see, looking around the BAU, that the camera feed was on in the conference room. He also knew that Spencer, Derek and Emily had it up on their computers in the bullpen and he knew that JJ, Dave and Strauss had it up in their offices. It was their only link to Sampson and they were all hoping that he would screw up and give away his location. It was also their only link with Jane.

Hotch both loved and hated the camera feed. He loved it because he could see that Jane was still alive, and he hated it because he could see all of the horrible things that were happening to her…well, not everything. He thought he was going to lose it when Sampson turned off the camera earlier. He knew that the son of a bitch had raped his daughter and for that, he was going to pay. When the camera came back on twenty minutes later, Hotch could see fresh bruises on Jane's collarbone and arms. Not only had the son of a bitch raped her, he had also beaten her again. He knew his daughter was strong, but he felt horribly guilty that she had to go through this.

When he saw Sampson beating Jane earlier, part of him died. He could swear he felt every blow that she did and when she tried to escape, her scuffle with Sampson had taken place out of the range of the camera lens. He couldn't see what was going on but he could hear it and when he heard the gunshot he almost broke down. He had expected to see Sampson carrying Jane's dead body, but instead he saw Jane with blood running down her arm. He had never been more thankful and horrified at the same time.

He looked up from his computer when he heard Derek ask about how he was doing. Hotch didn't have his door closed and team members had been popping in to check on him all night, even Dave, who by all rights should be pissed as hell with him.

"I don't know how I'm doing anymore." Hotch replied. "I don't know which is worse, seeing her or not seeing her."

"You know we're going to get her back, right Hotch? You KNOW that!" Derek said forcefully.

"I keep telling myself that, Derek." Hotch said tiredly. "Where is everyone?"

"JJ is with Garcia; Reid, Gideon and Emily are getting a couple of hours sleep in the dorm, and I think Dave is passed out on his couch. We are meeting for a status report at 600am, so they all only have a few more minutes left to sleep." Derek told him. "You look like you could use a couple of hours of sleep yourself."

"I will try to get a few hours of sleep after the status report," Hotch promised, "but right now I really need some coffee."

Hotch got up to get some coffee and then sat down abruptly; Sampson had just walked into Jane's room.

*********

Jane heard the door open and looked towards it, dreading what was coming. She saw the kidnapper enter and set down what appeared to be a bunch of pairs of handcuffs. Before she could wonder what those were for, he pulled a bottle of water out of a shopping bag and handed it to her. Jane knew the water could be drugged, but she didn't care, she was SO thirsty.

She opened the bottle of water and drank the entire thing in about 10 seconds. She set the empty bottle down on the ground next to the bed and looked Sampson in the eye. She didn't know what he was about to do, but she wouldn't show him any fear if she could help it.

"Do you have to go to the bathroom?" He asked her.

Jane was surprised, she had assumed that he was going to beat her again. "Yeah, I do."

He pulled out his gun. "I'm going to undo the shackle and let you walk to the bathroom, but if you try to escape or try to fight me, I'll shoot you. I won't kill you, but I will wound you and you will have that pain to contend with. Got it?"

"Got it," Jane spat out.

He undid the shackle and walked Jane out of the room and down a short hallway to the bathroom. He stood aside and let her enter the room. "You can close the door but if you try to lock it, I'll break it down and then you can use the toilet with me watching."

Jane closed the door and quickly went to the bathroom. When she was finished she stood up and looked in the mirror, almost throwing up when she saw her face. God, there was so much bruising and blood. She wondered what she would look like if she ever got out of here alive. She was pulled out of her reverie by a loud pounding at the door.

"You have ten seconds to get out here, or else I will come in and remove you!" The kidnapper yelled.

Jane quickly opened the door, not wanting to piss him off further and walked back to her room. Once there, her kidnapper grabbed a set of the handcuffs and handcuffed her right arm to the bed instead of using the chain shackle. This restricted her movement even more, but she could sit up on the bed. Before she could ask him about the handcuffs he tossed another bottle of water to her. Not knowing when she would get more, she drank the entire thing. When she was finished, the kidnapper pulled a metal chair up to the bed and just stared at her, smirking slightly. After a few minutes, Jane got tired of the staring.

"What?" She asked, irritated.

"I'll bet you're pretty pissed at your father right now." He replied.

Jane was confused, that wasn't the answer she had been expecting. "Why would I be pissed at him?"

"It's his fault you're here. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have gone to jail and Annie wouldn't have been put into foster care. The great Agent Aaron Hotchner is why we're here today. Maybe if he gave a shit about you he would have taken a less dangerous job, but no, he had to put his career in front of his family. He knows it, your mother knew it and deep down, even you know it." He taunted.

"You don't know a fucking thing about my mother! She was a great woman and she and my father loved each other until the day she died and she and I have _always_ come first to my father!" Jane yelled to him. Her reward was a backhand across the face, but either it wasn't as hard as normal, or Jane was getting used to the pain but it didn't affect her as much as it normally did. "You also don't know dick about my father. He has always had time for me and I've always known that I'm his top priority. I have _never_ doubted his love for me!" She was afraid this might provoke him, but she didn't care...there was no way he was going to say that stuff about her family and get away with it. Jane was surprised to see that he didn't get up to hit her.

"My Annie used to love me like you do your father," he said, a little bit wistfully, "but that was before your father came and fucked everything up."

"Maybe if you had loved your daughter as much as you say you did, you would have stayed out of trouble for her. Sounds to me like you were a shitty father." Jane said, knowing that it was going to cause her more pain but unable to resist.

The kidnapper looked at her and was about to get up and beat her when the timer he was carrying went off. "Oops, your punishment for insubordination will have to wait…it's done." He said, walking to the door and picking up the rest of the handcuffs. He came back over to Jane and started handcuffing her other wrist and ankles to the bed frame.

"What's done?" Jane asked uneasily.

"You see Jane," the kidnapper said, almost conversationally, "I realized I've been going about this all wrong. I want you to experience what my Annie experienced and while she did experience these random beatings that you've been getting, her abuse was much more systematic, so I've decided to tone down these random beatings and inflict pain on you in the ways which Annie told me about during our weekly phone calls." He finished securing her to the bed, went to the corner of the room and brought back a bucket, which he placed on the floor on the left side of the bed up near her head. "The first thing that the lovely 'system' did to her was strip her of her identity and made her into a number, so that's what I'm going to do to you." With that, he lowered the right side of her shorts so the waistband was resting on her upper thigh.

"I-I don't un-understand." Jane said nervously. She could tell this was going to be bad, really bad.

"You don't understand right now, but you will in a few minutes. Be right back!" He sang maniacally as he left the room.

Jane barely had time to panic before he came back in. He was holding a long wooden pole and on the end was a metal number eight. The number eight was about four inches long and it was glowing a bright orange. 'OH MY GOD!' Jane thought. She knew _exactly_ what that was. Melody's grandparents lived on a farm and she went to visit them with her for a week during the summer when she was thirteen. She knew that her kidnapper holding a branding iron. He was going to brand her!

"I can tell that you know what this is, good for you! It's not a long series of numbers like Annie became, in fact it is actually an infinity symbol that I've turned length wise, but it will do." As he came towards her, Jane started thrashing violently.

"Now Sweetie," he said in a mockingly stern tone, "if you fight me on this, I will brand you in four different places; if you cooperate with me, I will only brand you once. It's your choice, but I would decide soon if I were you, I've heard it's much more painful if the iron has cooled down."

Jane was terrified, but she wasn't an idiot; while she didn't want to be branded at all, she sure as hell didn't want to be branded four times. It took all of her willpower but she stopped thrashing and held still.

"Smart girl," her kidnapper said, coming towards her again.

'OK Jane, you can get through this,' she told herself. 'Stay strong, it won't…_oh my god, _THE PAIN!'

Jane felt the branding iron hit the skin on the right side of her pelvis, right where the hip turned into stomach. She thought she was going to die, in fact she prayed for death; she had never felt a pain like that in her life! On a scale of 1-10, the pain was a 175! It took over her entire body, she was aware of nothing else. He wasn't taking the iron away, it was still on her! Finally, her vision darkened and mercifully she started to lose consciousness.

The kidnapper saw that she was starting to pass out and removed the branding iron. He set it down and then reached into his pocket and pulled out a large, paper wrapped tablet and moved to Jane's head.

"Uh uh, can't have you passing out on me, if that happens you won't feel the full effect of the pain." Patting himself on the back for remembering to bring smelling salts with him, he snapped the ammonia tablet in half and shoved it under Jane's nose.

Jane was snapped back into consciousness. Again, the only thing she felt was the excruciating pain in her stomach and hip! She tried writhing on the bed, in hopes that the movement would relieve some of the pain, but the handcuffs kept her in place. The kidnapper must have taken a little bit of pity on her at this point because he undid all of the handcuffs and put the chain shackle back on her right wrist. She was able to thrash around on the bed, but that didn't help relieve the pain. Finally exhausted, Jane went still, hoping to get herself under control. The first thing she did was take a deep breath.

Big mistake! She breathed in through her nose and she could smell the scent of her burnt flesh. She now knew why the kidnapper had placed a bucket near her head and was almost grateful for it. Jane twisted on to her left side and threw up at the smell of her own burning flesh. Once she was done, she turned on her back again and laid there in a semi-conscious state.

"Sweet dreams, Sweetie." The kidnapper said with a laugh as he left the room.

**********

Both Hotch and Derek stared at the computer screen in horror and they could hear gasps coming from various parts of the bullpen. Most of the team had seen what had happened as they made their way from the dorm to the BAU for the status report.

Derek had seen a lot of horrible things in his life, but this was one of the worst things he had ever witnessed. He didn't know how Hotch was holding it together.

"Hotch…Hotch…HOTCH!" Aaron finally looked in Derek's direction.

"We ARE going to get her back Hotch." Derek assured him.

"Soon, Derek…we have to get her back soon." Hotch said in almost a whisper. "God only knows how much more she can take."


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 7

* * *

The next two days passed in a blur for Hotch. Watching his daughter get branded was the worst moment of his life, it even surpassed hearing the news that Haley had died. He watched Jane writhe in pain and he willed her to keep breathing, to not give up. He could see that she was in horrible pain and he wished he could take her place.

On the plus side, the random beatings seemed to have lessened, but that was only because Sampson had developed more ritualized beatings for Jane. At around three o'clock that second day, Hotch was sitting in Garcia's office and they watched Sampson beat Jane severely with a leather belt on her back and legs. He did it through her clothes, but Hotch knew from experience as a kid that clothing wasn't much protection from a beating like that. His heart skipped a beat every time the belt struck her, especially when it was the buckle hitting her.

At noon on the third day, Sampson came into Jane's room with a long wooden dowel that was the thickness of his index finger and he again struck her back and legs with it. Jane screamed with every blow, and Hotch knew he would hear those screams in his dreams until the day he died. On both days, Sampson turned off the camera for one twenty minute interval and Hotch knew that during those times, Sampson was violating his daughter. Each time the camera came back on, Jane looked more defeated and she had fresh bruises. He had never felt so helpless in his life.

The intellectual part of his brain knew that Jane couldn't last much longer. Sampson hadn't fed her since he took her and he only gave her water before the horribly painful things he gave her. She was averaging about two bottles of water each day and Hotch knew, mostly because Spencer announced it at a status briefing, that it wasn't enough water for a person under normal conditions, but with the trauma Jane was suffering it wasn't even close to enough to sustain her life for much longer.

He was frustrated as hell that they couldn't find where Sampson was hiding. They had been through every record they could find and they all led them to nothing. He and his team could perform profiling miracles for complete strangers, but they couldn't do anything to help someone who was close to everyone. It was enough to make him fear that if he ever found Sampson, he would turn into one of the very monsters he had been chasing since he had joined the BAU.

**********

Jane prayed for death. She knew she was giving up, that her father would be devastated if she died but she didn't care anymore, she just needed the beatings and the pain to stop. Every part of her body hurt and she was sure that she didn't have an unmarked part left. The pain from the bullet graze and branding were the worst pains and she was pretty sure that both of those wounds were infected. It didn't help that when her kidnapper came into the room, he would either dig his fingers into the bullet wound or hit her branding so they wouldn't heal.

She could feel herself getting weaker and she knew that it was partly from the trauma she had sustained and partly from the fact that she hadn't eaten anything since breakfast on the day she was taken. She also knew that she wasn't getting enough water, but she dreaded it when he brought her water because she knew then that he was getting ready to do something _really_ horrendous to her. He brought her water right before he beat her with that horrible, thick leather belt. That had hurt something awful and she tried passing out during it, but he brought her back to consciousness with those damned smelling salts. She prayed for death the next day while he was beating her with that awful stick, but apparently god wasn't taking her calls because she lived through that too.

He had also turned the camera off two more times and then beat her when it was off. She wondered about that, but she didn't spare much thought for it because she honestly didn't care why he did it, all she knew was that he loved slamming her up against the wall because just about every time he did that, her head cracked against the wall. As a result she had an almost blinding headache to add to her list of pains. In short, she was a mess and she knew that if she got out of this alive, she would have weeks, if not months of painful recovery. She wasn't sure if it was worth it.

***********

At noon on the fourth day, the team, including Strauss, was gathered in the conference room for a status update. There wasn't much new to add to the report, but they met anyway. They all knew that time was running out, that eventually they would witness Sampson kill Jane and they were doing everything they could to get her back before it got to that point, but they had hit dead ends at every turn.

Dave was discussing Jane's injuries with Spencer, trying to get a sense of how long she could survive with them when Garcia came running into the conference room.

"I have an address!" She practically screamed.

"WHAT? How?" Dave asked her as the team leapt to their feet.

"The equipment he was using to reroute the signal must have gone down and I was able to pinpoint his location. He's in an abandoned house about twenty minutes from here in an almost empty neighborhood. Most of the houses in that area were foreclosed upon so it makes sense that no one would hear or see anything suspicious." She said, running to keep up with the team as they dashed to the elevator. "I've sent the address to your PDA's and to the GPS units in the SUV's."

While they were waiting for it, Garcia pulled Dave to the side. "Don't let Hotch do anything stupid, Dave. He might want to kill this son of a bitch now, but if he kills him in cold blood, he will eventually regret it and he will never get over it."

"I will try my best Garcia, but I can't guarantee anything…hell, I can't guarantee that _I _won't kill him in cold blood." Dave told her.

"Just get our girl back, sir." Garcia ordered, with tears in her eyes.

"I will Garcia, I will. You stay here and monitor that camera feed and let us know if _anything_ changes." Dave ordered, getting onto the elevator.

***********

'Damn,' Sampson thought, 'my system went down, they will know where to find me.'

He couldn't believe his luck, he had wanted to keep her for a few more days, have a little more fun with her and her father, but now that they knew where she was he was going to have to kill her.

He walked into her room one last time and was pleased to see the fear in her eyes. At first she had tried to remain strong, to not let her fear show through, but a few beatings and the branding got past her defenses. It was a pity really; he had liked their banter during those first two days. He gave serious thought to giving her one last beating, but decided that he didn't have time. Instead, he walked up to her and watched her for a minute. Finally, he reached out his hand and stroked her cheek.

"You would have grown up to be a magnificent woman," he whispered as he unshackled her and walked out of the room.

He got back to his room off of the main room and picked up the six foot length of rope. She was going to die just the way his Annie had and that would be his parting gift to Aaron Hotchner. He quickly started making a noose out of the rope.

**********

They took two SUV's to Sampson's house. Emily was driving one with JJ and Spencer and in front of them; Derek was driving Dave and Hotch. They were both driving as fast as possible to the house, Dave calling for ambulances and the local police department to meet them there, but to use a silent approach.

They were about five minutes from the scene and Hotch and Dave were both putting on their vests and checking their guns when Dave's phone rang. He answered it and put it on speaker phone.

"Rossi," he barked as he secured his weapon in it's holster.

"Something's changed, Dave!" Garcia yelled into the phone.

"What happened, Garcia?" Dave asked with a feeling of dread. No way were they going to get this close only to have Sampson kill Jane. No way!

"He came into her room, watched her for a minute, stroked her cheek almost lovingly, unchained her and then left." She replied.

"Shit, he knows that we know where he is!" Dave yelled.

"THEN YOU HAVE TO HURRY, SIR!" Garcia screeched.

They drove quicker than they ever had for any other case, beating the ambulance and local PD. They got to the house and kicked in the door. They already knew that Sampson was holding Jane in the basement, so they didn't bother spending much time securing the ground floor. They approached the basement door and found it locked. Dave had Derek kicked the door in and as soon as it was open, Hotch and the rest of the team ran down the stairs and found Sampson. They had surprised him; they could tell that he thought he had more time. He was holding the noose as they came through the door to his workroom.

"Freeze, Sampson!" Hotch yelled, pointing his gun at him as he entered the room.

Sampson froze. "Ah, Agent Hotchner, we meet again. I wish I could say that you look well, but you really don't. Haven't you been sleeping well?"

"Shut the fuck up!" Derek told him, still in front of him.

Sampson paid him no attention, focusing entirely on Hotch. "So you got here before I could kill her, good for you! But, will you want what's left of your daughter? She will never be the same, you know. My hope is that I've gotten her pregnant so that part of me will live on inside of her."

"You fucking son of a bitch!" Hotch said softly, slowly walking closer to Sampson, his gun still pointed at him. The rest of the team could see that he was debating killing him. They all knew that if Hotch killed him they would keep it quiet, they would testify that it was justifiable.

It was Dave who spoke up. "Not like this, Hotch."

Hotch didn't acknowledge that Dave had said anything. He tried again.

"Hotch, you know you will regret this. Come on, let's cuff him and get to Jane." Dave said.

Still nothing from Hotch, although Dave could tell that he was listening to him.

"Jane is going to need you fully in order to recover from this. You _know_ if you kill him it will eat a part of you up inside and you can't spare that part. If it was a justifiable kill, it would be different, but he hasn't given us a reason for a justifiable kill. Come on Hotch, you know I'm right about this." Dave honestly didn't care if Hotch killed the fucker or not, but he knew that eventually Hotch would realize what he had done and he would regret it.

Hotch debated for another thirty seconds and then lowered his gun. "Cuff him and get him the fuck out of here, Morgan." He ordered, turning to go find his daughter.

Derek holstered his gun and approached Sampson. Once he was about two feet away from him, Sampson reached into his back waistband and pulled out his weapon.

"GUN!" Derek yelled, reaching for his own. As it turned out, he didn't need to raise it. As soon as he heard Derek's yell, Hotch turned around, raised his gun and fired, shooting Sampson in the middle of his forehead. Sampson was dead before he hit the ground.

"You're right Dave, that feels much better." Hotch said as he opened the door to Jane's room.

**********

Jane heard her door open and looked up in trepidation, her kidnapper was back. As she mentally prepared herself for another beating, she looked at him; he was just standing next to her bed staring at her. After about a minute, he stroked her cheek and told her that she would have grown up to be a magnificent woman, unchained her and then left the room. That scared Jane more than anything he had done to her. She knew he was going to kill her.

As much as she had prayed for death, now that it was actually about to happen, she was frightened. She wondered if anyone would ever find her body. She knew that this would destroy her father, and she prayed that Dave and the rest of the team would be able to get him through it. Finally, she prayed that her death would be quick, that the kidnapper wouldn't drag it out. She had suffered so much pain already, she felt she deserved to have a quick and painless death. She heard a loud bang from outside of her door, but she was too frightened and weak to even care. She heard her door open again.

**********

The first thing that Hotch felt when he stepped through the door to Jane's room was a deep coldness. Sampson must have brought a portable air conditioner or freezing apparatus in order to add to Jane's torture. He could almost see his breath in the room.

The coldness was the least of his concerns, his main concern was lying on the bed . Jane hadn't even looked up when they entered the room and he approached her bed softly, not wanting to frighten her.

He wanted to gather her in his arms and tell her it was all right, that everything would be OK, but he knew it was a lie. She had months, if not years of physical and psychological recovery to go through, and even then she may never be OK. He got to her bed and whispered, "Jane."

"Dad?" She said weakly still laying on the bed, half-conscious.

He felt helpless, he knew he should be comforting her, but he knew that she had been raped and he had interviewed enough rape victims to know that they usually didn't want to be touched, especially by a male.

"Jane," he said softly, kneeling down next to her bed. He silently kissed her on the forehead, not knowing what else to do.

"Dad!" Jane said, trying to sit up. She finally got into a sitting position and threw her arms around her father.

***********

_I know that this is kind of a quick ending to the kidnapping part of the story, but the story was getting really dark for me to write and I needed to get past the kidnapping. Sorry if it seems rushed. _

_This is by no means the end of the story. I envision MANY more chapters with Jane and Hotch and the rest of the team dealing with the aftermath of the kidnapping._


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 8

* * *

Hotch gently engulfed Jane into a hug, moving from the floor to the edge of her bed. He could feel her softly crying against him, which was OK since he was softly crying against her. They sat like that until the ambulance arrived and the EMT's came to take care of her.

"Sir, you are going to have to move out of the way so that we can assess the patient's injuries." One of them said.

Hotch reluctantly let go of Jane. "I'll be right over here Sweetie," he could see her bristle at the term of endearment. There was both a male EMT and a female EMT and Dave pulled the male EMT to the side.

"Unless she's new or something, I want your partner to take the lead on this one. This girl was kidnapped, tortured and raped for the last four days and she will be more comfortable with a woman helping her." Dave ordered.

The EMT, Paul, could see that this was a man of power and knew not to argue with him. "That's fine sir, let me just inform my partner, Mary, of the situation. Since the patient-"

"Jane. Her name is Jane." Hotch interrupted.

"Since Jane will be answering a lot of questions at the hospital, we won't ask her many here. That way she will have to relive it one less time." Paul told them.

"Thanks." Hotch said gratefully, as Paul went to talk to his partner.

It took the EMT's about fifteen minutes to assess Jane's condition, take her vital signs and prepare her for transport. During that time, Hotch stayed close to them, never letting Jane out of his sight. The only time he looked away from her was when the female EMT, Mary, had to check the injuries under Jane's tank top.

When he looked away, he studied the rest of his team; there wasn't a dry eye in the house, even Derek looked like he had been crying. He realized that he owed his team big time. Not only had they all helped crack this case, they helped him through it personally. He knew that none of them had been home since this started, and he was willing to bet that he and Jane would have a lot of company at the hospital over the next few days.

While the EMT's got Jane ready for transport, Dave called Garcia. "We got her Penelope." Dave said, exhaling for the first time in what seemed like days.

"I know, I'm watching and listening to you right now." Garcia said, crying. Dave turned to the camera and gave a little wave.

"What hospital are they taking her to?" Penelope asked him.

Dave stayed facing the camera. "George Washington, it's a bit farther than some of the other hospitals, but with the injuries that Jane sustained, the EMT's want her to go to a trauma center."

"I'll call them to let them know you're coming. Every time Jane was hurt, I put it on an additional recording. I'll email the recording of her beatings to the ER so they can see how she was injured." Garcia told him.

"You're the best, you know that Garcia?" Dave said softly.

"Thanks Dave." Garcia said, crying again. "I'll meet you there."

"OK, but Garcia? Have a junior agent drive you. The last thing we need is for you to get into an accident racing to the hospital."

"Will do, good sir." Garcia said, her bubbly personality showing through for the first time since the ordeal first began.

**********

The ambulance carrying Jane and Hotch arrived at the George Washington Hospital ER twenty minutes later. Jane, having felt every bump on the ride, was holding Hotch's hand, trying not to cry. As they wheeled her into the ER, the doctors and nurses along with Garcia met up with them.

"Jane Sweetie, I am _so_ glad to see you! How are you doing?" Penelope asked, kissing her cheek.

"I've been better, Pen." Jane said, with a small smile.

"I can see that, honey." Garcia told her, crying a little.

When they got to the trauma room, a nurse stopped them and said, "This is as far as you can come sir." Hotch watched them wheel his daughter into the room.

"You don't understand, that's my daughter and she's been missing, beaten and tortured for four days!" Hotch all but yelled.

"I understand that sir, we received the video from a Ms. Garcia. The fact remains that you can't come in here." The nurse was firm.

"No, YOU don't understand! I am a federal agent-" Hotch's tirade was interrupted by Garcia.

"Hotch, they are going to have to examine her. You can't be there for that." It took Hotch a moment, but he finally understood what Garcia was saying; not only were they going to examine her injuries, they were going to have to do a rape exam. She was right, he couldn't…no, he _shouldn't _be there for that.

"Will you stay with her, Penelope?" He asked softly. He glanced through the door as it opened. They had cut off Jane's top and she only had her bra on. He could see the numerous bruises on her chest and abdomen.

Garcia looked at the nurse, who nodded. "I will stay with her the entire time Hotch, she won't be alone." Garcia promised.

"Thank you," he whispered as he turned and headed towards the waiting room.

********

Once they wheeled Jane into the exam room, she found herself alone with a bunch of strangers. Thanks to Garcia's phone call to the hospital the trauma team was mostly female, but still, they were strangers. The head doctor introduced herself to Jane.

"Hello Jane," she said gently, "my name is Sarah Adams and I am the head of the trauma team that will be taking care of you. Ms. Garcia called ahead and told us what happened and she sent us a video of what happened to you, so we are in a really good position to treat you right now. We are going to ask you a bunch of questions, but if you have questions for us at any time, please ask us. I will try to explain what I am doing every step of the way."

Jane liked the doctor, she was older and she reminded her of a kindly grandmother. "Will it hurt?"

"I'm not going to lie to you Jane, you will have some pain while we manipulate your injuries and move you around so we can see the extent of your wounds. We can't give you pain medicine right now because we need you to be able to answer our questions as clearly as possible, but I promise once the exam is done I will give you enough pain medicine to both take away your pain and help you sleep. OK?"

Jane took a deep breath. "Do what you have to do."

"The first thing we need to do is get you out of your clothes so we can see your injuries. Are you alright with that?" Dr. Adams asked.

"Yes," Jane whispered. The sooner they cut her clothes, the sooner they would be done with this.

"Ok, here we go." Dr. Adams sat her up a little to cut off her tank top and she heard a couple of the nurses gasp as they saw her back and torso. They laid her back down and started cutting off her shorts.

Jane squeezed her eyes shut in anticipation of the pain, but it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be, in fact it was actually nice to get her shirt away from some of the cuts on her back. While it wasn't painful, Jane was feeling abandoned and she wished she had someone there that she knew. Just as she thought that, she felt someone pick up her hand and then she heard a familiar voice.

"You didn't really think I would leave you alone, did you?" Penelope asked with a slight smile.

"Thanks for staying with me, Pen," Jane said.

"Just try and get me to leave, Sweetie." Garcia told her, noticing that Jane stiffened when she heard that nickname.

After they cut her clothes, they started a large IV in her hand, which hurt like hell. It felt like they using a needle the size of a sink pipe. Once they started getting fluids into her though, she started feeling a tiny bit better.

The doctor hadn't lied, a lot of what they did to her hurt and at first she tried to hide her tears, but she couldn't hold them back for very long. They cut away her clothes and covered her with a sheet so they could examine her more easily. She felt them pushing on her stomach and ribcage which hurt like hell. She almost screamed when Dr. Adams touched her branding and she thought she would pass out from the pain when they examined her nose.

She knew her back must have looked bad, because when they turned her over, Garcia got tears in her eyes and squeezed her hand even harder. It was when they repositioned her on her back that they threw her for a loop.

Dr. Adams came to the head of her bed and said, "Jane, now I'm going to do a rape exam, do you know what that is?"

Jane was confused. "Yes, I know what that is, but why are you doing one on me? I wasn't raped."

Now it was Dr. Adams' turn to look confused. "But your father and the other FBI agents told us you were."

"But I wasn't." Jane said.

Penelope spoke up. "Jane, honey, in the video Sampson said he was going to rape you every time he turned off the camera."

"What do you mean, 'in the video.'" Jane asked her.

"The camera in your room wasn't just a security camera, it was a live camera feed and Sampson sent us the link. We've been watching you since the day you were taken." Garcia told her.

"Oh my god! You all watched that? My dad had to watch me being beaten?" Jane couldn't believe it but she filed the information away for later. "I know that the first time he turned off the camera he tried raping me and he came pretty close, but in the end he said that he couldn't violate a kid like that. He must have done it the other times just to drive my dad insane."

"Are you sure, Jane? He could have done something to you while you were unconscious." Dr. Adams told her.

"I'm sure he didn't, but do the rape exam just so we're certain about it." Jane said.

Dr. Adams performed the rape exam and afterwards she told Jane that there was no evidence of sexual assault. She then told Jane that they were going to need to take x-rays of her ribs, back, leg, nose and skull.

"Do you think he cracked my skull?" Jane asked, thinking back to all of the times he threw her against the wall.

"I don't think so, but I want to take every precaution." Dr. Adams replied. "The x-rays are going to hurt since we have to position you just so, but I think you've answered all of the questions we need, so I will start you on IV pain killers. Those should knock you out for quite a while and it will make the x-rays much easier on you. OK?"

"OK," Jane responded.

"One more thing Jane. I know that your father and a large number of FBI agents are in the waiting room waiting for an update. Can I share your medical information with them?" Dr. Adams asked.

Jane had never had a doctor ask her that before, usually they just told her father whatever he wanted to know about her. "That's fine," Jane told her.

"Great, here we go." Dr. Adams said as she injected the pain medicine into Jane's IV.

Jane talked to Penelope for another two minutes before passing out.

**********

Hotch was pacing out in the waiting room, what the hell was taking them so long?! It had been two hours since they wheeled his daughter back into the trauma room and he hadn't gotten an update. He was ready to storm back there and get the report one way or another.

"Agent Hotchner?" Hotch looked up at the older woman in scrubs calling his name.

"I'm Aaron Hotchner. How's Jane, is she all right?" He asked her.

"She's resting as comfortably as she can right now. Why don't you all come back to the family conference room with me and I will update you on her condition." Dr. Adams said, leading them into the ER. Once in the family room the team, including Strauss who had ridden to the hospital with Garcia, sat down around the table.

"Agent Hotchner, I am going to go through all of Jane's injuries with you and your team. If you have questions at any time during this conference, please ask me. Jane has given me permission to fully discuss her medical information with all of you."

"Thanks Doctor…" Hotch didn't know the doctor's name.

"Adams, Sarah Adams." Doctor Adams replied, taking a deep breath. "I will start with the less serious items first. When Jane was brought in, she was suffering from a mild case of hypothermia. It's puzzling as to how that happened since its mid-September and fairly warm outside. Any ideas on how it got that cold where she was being held?"

"We think the kidnapper brought in a freezing apparatus of some sort to cool Jane's room down." Emily replied.

"That makes sense. Anyway, we corrected that with warmed IV fluid and blankets. As you could see, Jane sustained multiple bruises and abrasions to numerous parts of her body. The majority are on her back where she was struck by the belt and the wooden dowel. I've watched the video and I've examined and x-rayed her back and have concluded there is no injury to the spine, just bruises, about a dozen cuts from the belt and many welts. I don't anticipate much, if any infection at those sites." She said, pausing for a minute before continuing.

"There are some deep bruises on her upper right thigh, but no bone or long-term muscle damage. There were also some bruises on her abdomen, where he kneed her, but again there was no internal bleeding." Hotch was thankful for that, he knew if there had been internal bleeding Jane would be heading to an operating room right now.

Dr. Adams continued. "She is pretty severely dehydrated and I have her on IV fluids right now and I am hoping to get her electrolytes balanced out soon. Her kidney function tests showed that her kidneys are having some problems due to the dehydration, but I am not anticipating any long-term kidney damage. She also told me that her abductor did not give her any food and that she hasn't eaten in four or five days. Is this correct?" She asked them.

"That's correct, Doc." Gideon replied.

"In that case, for the next couple of days we will be giving her nutrients through her IV. After that, she should be awake enough to eat solid foods on her own." Moving away from the least serious injuries, she started the discussion about some of the more serious injuries. "Jane has two cracked ribs on her lower left side and some bruised ribs on both sides. I don't anticipate any complications from the cracked ribs but because of the pain that comes the cracked and bruised ribs, she is having some difficulty taking a deep breath. We will have to watch this as it can sometimes lead to pneumonia." Dr. Adams noticed Hotch's worried look, but decided to keep going with the update.

"Jane has a moderate concussion. While it's not severe, it's not mild either as she repeatedly sustained trauma to her head since the first concussive blow four days ago. Jane told me that when he turned the camera off, her captor liked throwing her against the wall and she hit her head numerous times. The x-ray did not reveal any skull fractures but she may suffer long term effects from the concussion, such as migraine headaches. I will have someone from neurology evaluate her in a few days." Dr. Adams had seen the looks at the table when she mentioned the camera being turned off.

"I performed a rape exam on Jane and there is no evidence or trauma indicated that Jane was sexually assaulted in any way-" Hotch interrupted her.

"But he said that he was going to violate her. Are you sure about this?" He asked her.

"I am. I spoke with Jane and she says that her abductor did not hurt her in that way. She says that when he turned the camera off he beat her, but he did not rape her. She said that he told her that he could not hurt a child like that. She believes he turned the camera off in order to drive you crazy." Dr. Adams told them.

Hotch let out a breath that he didn't know he had been holding. He was grateful that his daughter hadn't been hurt in that way. It's not that he would have looked at or treated her any differently, but he was glad that she wouldn't have to go through both the psychological and physical recovery of rape.

Dr. Adams continued, "The bullet wound to her arm and the branding on her hip are infected. It's not a severe infection, but it's not a mild one either and right now the infection is causing her to run a fever. I stitched up her arm, bandaged it and started her on a course of broad spectrum IV antibiotics. The antibiotics should clear up the infections at both sites in about a week." Dr. Adams paused for a minute to check her beeper and then continued.

"The branding on her hip and stomach area and her nose are Jane's two most serious injuries. The branding is causing her the most pain and it is a bad burn. We will need to debride the wound every day in order to keep it clean and to promote healing and Jane will need a skin graft at some point in order to cover it. I will send a plastic surgeon in to talk to you and Jane in a few days. Jane's nose is definitely broken and will need to be surgically reset. I will have the plastic surgeon discuss that with you as well when she comes in to discuss the skin graft. Normally Jane would be able to have the surgery on her nose done right away, but she is too weak right now, so we will need to wait a month or two to do it. There were no other broken bones in Jane's face, just a lot of bruising and swelling and some minor cuts that shouldn't leave scars." Dr. Adams finished. "Do you have any questions?"

"Other than the antibiotics, how are you treating Jane?" Hotch asked her while the team sat in shock over the extent of Jane's injuries.

"There is not a whole lot we can do but observe her and give her time to heal. Right now I have her on IV pain medications to manage her pain and to help her sleep, otherwise we will be keeping an eye on her ribs and kidneys and we will be monitoring the infection." Dr. Adams replied.

"I'm sorry doctor, but isn't deep sleep contra-indicated in patients with concussions?" Spencer asked.

"Normally it is," Dr. Adams responded, "but Ms. Garcia said that based on what you observed from the camera feed, Jane has barely slept the last few days. Her body needs to make up for that sleep in order to heal and gain strength. Since the original concussive blow took place four days ago, I am confident the deep sleep will not harm her. I also consulted with the head of the neurology and he concurred with my assessment."

"Does Jane know the extent of her injuries, Dr. Adams?" JJ asked her.

"Not as of right now. I started Jane on the pain medication before we x-rayed her and she passed out about half an hour ago. I plan on discussing it with her in a few days, once she's had more sleep." Dr. Adams responded.

She looked around the room as there were no more questions. "So, in short, Jane is a mess right now, but considering the length of time she spent in captivity, she could be much, _much_ worse. She will be pretty much out of it for the next couple of days due to her level of exhaustion paired with the pain medicine. I am having her moved to a private room and you can see her in twenty minutes, once we get her settled. I have informed the staff on Jane's floor that there will be no restrictions on the number of visitors in Jane's room and there will be no set visiting hours, so you can all come and go as you please. I know you folks keep as irregular hours as we doctors do." Dr. Adams said, getting up.

"Thank you, Dr. Adams. You have no idea how much we all appreciate this." Hotch said, shaking her hand.

After the doctor left, Hotch sat back down and absorbed the all of the information about Jane and her injuries. He felt his chest and throat tightening up and he felt the sting of tears in his eyes. He was about to lose it and he didn't want to do it in front of his team. He jumped up and almost ran out of the conference room looking for somewhere private. Finding none, he went into the nearest men's bathroom, praying it would be empty. It seemed that God was finally listening to him as the men's room was deserted. Hotch dashed in and threw up in one of the toilets, remembering the brief sight of his daughter's chest and abdomen as he did so. 'Those weren't even the worst injuries,' he thought to himself as he heaved again.

He finally finished being sick and went to the sink to rinse out his mouth. Once he was done doing that, he stood with his back against one of the walls and tried to breathe deep. He couldn't, and the tears he had been holding back for the last four days finally won. He slowly slid down the wall and sat on the floor, sobbing the entire time.

**********

The team watched as Hotch dashed out of the conference room. "We should go after him." Derek said, getting up from his chair.

"Give him some time and then we'll find him." Gideon said, staying in his seat.

"Come on Gideon, he needs us right now." Derek argued.

"What he needs right now is a few minutes to himself." Dave said, siding with Jason. "He's going to lose it and he needs some privacy. Would you want to lose it in front of the team?"

Derek sat back down. "No, you're right."

After ten minutes had passed with still no sign of Hotch, Gideon stood up. "OK, _now_ we go looking for him. The rest of you stay here, Jane's doctor should be coming out with her room number soon, text it to me when you get it. Dave, Derek and I will look for Hotch."

The three men left the room and started looking for Hotch. They looked in a couple of empty rooms and then Dave stuck his head in the men's room. "Gid, he's in here."

Gideon walked into the men's room and Dave started to follow when he turned to Derek and said, "no one gets into this bathroom Derek, no one. You are officially the bathroom monitor." Dave said, going into the bathroom.

Hotch looked up when he saw the door opened and was surprised to find his two mentors standing there. By this time he had finished crying, but he was still sitting on the floor, just staring into space.

Dave and Jason looked at each other and they sat down next to Hotch, one on either side of him. They didn't hug him or say anything, they just sat there.

After a minute, Hotch started speaking. "I can't believe this happened. I can't believe this happened to Jane."

"The important thing is that she's all right, Hotch." Jason said, softly.

"All right?" Hotch said, turning towards Jason. "How can you say she's all right? Did you hear the doctor back there?" Both men could hear the tears threatening his voice again.

"She _is _all right, Hotch. She'll heal, she made it out alive." Gideon told him.

Hotch blew out a quivering breath. "She was close Jason, too damn close. She was minutes, maybe _seconds_ away from death. God, if we had been any later, we would have found her body hanging from the ceiling."

"But she didn't die and that's what you have to focus on." Dave said firmly. "Look, you needed to lose it and you did, fine, but Jane is going to need you and she's going to need your strength. Now you need to get up off of this god awful floor and come with us to your daughter's room."

Hotch got up and walked towards the door with the two men. "Hotch, this isn't going to be easy for you either. If you need to lose it again, come find me or Jason, we'll help you out."

"Thanks guys." Hotch said, with a small, sheepish smile.

They walked out of the bathroom, met up with Derek and made their way towards Jane's room.

**

_OK, so this is a really long chapter. I thought about splitting it in half, but I realized that most of the second chapter would have been Jane's medical update and medical jargon and I figured no one wanted that, so bonus! You get a bigger chapter._

_I'm hoping to update "A Different Kind of Life" either tonight or tomorrow._


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 9

* * *

Dave, Jason and Hotch made their way to Jane's room. True to her word, Dr. Adams had informed the staff that the agents could visit whenever they wanted and there were no hassles on the way to the room. Once there, they found the entire team, except for Garcia, waiting in the hall.

"What's up guys?" Hotch asked, trying to pretend that everything was OK.

"How are you Hotch?" Emily asked.

"I'm all right; the day just caught up with me is all." He replied.

"Agent Hotchner, I was just telling the team that you are all on a two week stand down effective immediately. I don't want to see any of you in the office for at least a week, am I clear?" Strauss informed the team.

"Crystal clear, ma'am," JJ replied.

"Good. Aaron, you are on an indefinite personal leave, effective immediately. Dave will run the team while you are taking care of Jane, I don't want to hear that you've so much as checked your voice mail for the next two weeks. After Jane is out of the hospital and has recovered some at home, we will discuss you consulting on cases, but that's it while Jane recuperates. Is that understood?"

"Yes ma'am, and thank you." Hotch said. The team could tell that he was anxious to get into his daughter's room.

"Hotch, why don't you go into Jane's room? I have a couple of things to discuss with the team and then we'll be in." Dave told him.

Hotch didn't need to be told twice, he raced into Jane's room.

The team watched as he bent down and kissed her sleeping forehead, and then Dave suggested they move into the waiting room.

Once there Dave started to speak, "It goes without saying that everyone did a great job on this case, I know it was hard because it was personal for us and you all did a wonderful job. I know that Hotch would not have made it through this without all of us."

The team took a minute to think about that before Dave continued. "I know that none of you will want to go too far from here until Jane is awake and doing better. I also know that none of us live closer than half an hour from here, so since we are on stand down for awhile, I will go ahead and reserve rooms for us at the Melrose hotel, my treat. It's about a five minute walk down Pennsylvania Ave. This way we can all be nearby and not have to waste an hour on the commute. Since Jane will be asleep for awhile, you should all go home and pack. Once you get to the Melrose, just give the front desk my name and they will give you your room keys. Needless to say, you each have your own room."

Thanks were given all around by the team as they scattered to go home and pack. Dave caught JJ as she was leaving. "JJ, I'll reserve a suite for you so that Will and Henry can be with you and you all will have some comfort."

"Thank you so much Dave, you're a good guy." JJ said, kissing him on the cheek. After she left, Dave turned to Strauss who was still in the waiting room.

"I hope you realize that the hotel invitation was extended to you as well, Erin." Dave said.

Strauss was floored, "Me?"

"Yes, you and Jane have a bond and I know you are as worried about her as the rest of us. I hope we can put our differences aside for awhile for her sake." Dave said.

"I would like that as well, David." Strauss said. "Thank you for including me in this."

After Strauss left, Dave turned to Gideon, "We are going to need you here for awhile, old man. Are you up for it?"

"I don't have a choice," he said, "My family needs me. Of course I'll stay."

**********

As soon as Hotch entered Jane's room, he went to her bed and kissed her sleeping forehead. He then turned and saw Garcia sitting in one of the chairs. She stood up when she saw him watching her. He crossed the room and pulled her into a hug.

"Thank you, Garcia. Thank you for watching all of those horrible things happen to Jane, thank you for getting the address of where she was being held, thank you for staying with her in the ER and thank you for loving her like you do." Hotch whispered.

The emotions of the four days were catching up with Garcia, she knew she was about to lose it and she needed to get out Jane's room to do it. She pulled away from Hotch.

"Excuse me, Hotch." She said, running out of the room. Hotch knew what was happening and didn't follow her, knowing that she wanted to be alone.

**********

Garcia took off down the hall, trying to find a private place, the tears already pouring down her face. She burst into the waiting room, hoping she would find it empty. It wasn't, Dave was there looking over some paperwork. She stood frozen at the door.

Dave looked up when he heard the door open. Penelope stood in the doorway, frozen to the spot and shaking. Dave could see tear tracks on her cheeks and tears in her eyes and he knew that this was just the beginning, that she was going to lose it just like Hotch did. He knew that while Hotch needed privacy, Penelope needed a shoulder to cry on.

"Garcia," he said, coming over to her and grabbing her hand. He led her to the couch he had been sitting on, sat them both down and then put his arm around her shoulders. "It's OK Penelope, if anyone deserves to cry, it's you." With that, Garcia started sobbing into his chest.


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 10

* * *

The next day and a half passed in a blur for Hotch, as he barely left his daughter's side. He marked time by the comings and goings of various medical personnel. More often than not, there was a member of the team in the room with him, frequently more than one member. Garcia had left the hospital only once and that was to get a bag for herself and one for him and Jane.

He didn't think it was possible for his daughter to sleep for as long as she did, or as deeply as she did. Jane had inherited his light levels of sleep and any noise in the house usually woke her up, but here there were people parading in and out of her room all day and she didn't stir. Hotch knew that it was the high level of pain medicine in her system that was keeping her in a deep sleep, but it was still disconcerting. She slept while they checked her vital signs, when they started a second IV and when they debrided her branding. They kicked him out of the room during for that, but when he came back in; he saw that Jane was still asleep, although she had tears rolling down her cheeks. That's when he realized how painful the debriding had to be and he wondered with some unease, how Jane would handle it once she was awake.

The rest of the team tried to get him to go back to the hotel to sleep that night, but they were met with the famous Hotchner glare. Dave and Penelope had offered to stay with Jane in case she woke up, but Hotch refused to leave her room, he wanted to be the first person she saw when she woke up. The team had been good about bringing him meals, but he found that he wasn't hungry, especially for the horrible hospital food. All he wanted was for his daughter to wake up so he could talk to her and apologize to her for getting her into this mess. He knew she was beginning to heal on the outside and he was anxious for her to start healing on the inside as well.

At noon on the second day, Spencer, Derek, Emily and Penelope were in Jane's room with Hotch and they were all eating sandwiches from a nearby restaurant when Dr. Adams and two nurses came into Jane's room.

"Hello everyone, I am going to have to ask all of you to step out of the room, it's time for us to work on Jane's burn." Dr. Adams announced.

Derek and Spencer left the room, while Penelope gathered up her things. Hotch didn't move from his chair.

"Come on Hotch," Garcia said, "Let me buy you a really bad cup of coffee."

"No thanks Garcia, I'm staying here." Hotch told her.

"Agent Hotchner-" Dr. Adams began.

"Dr. Adams," Hotch interrupted, "I need to see what was done to her, I _need_ to! She is here largely because of me and my job. She would never let me see her wounds if she was conscious, but I have to see them, in part because she's my little girl and I want to know what happened to her and in part because I'm going to be taking care of her once she's home and I have to know the extent of her injuries."

Dr. Adams thought for a minute and then relented, "Are you _sure_ you want to be here for this, Agent Hotchner? Because I'm not going to just be debriding her branding today, I'll also be examining her back and arm as well. Those injuries are not going to be pretty to look at."

"I understand," he told her, "I'll be OK."

"All right. Ms. Garcia, I am assuming you will be helping to care for Jane once she is released from the hospital?" Dr. Adams asked her.

"I will be, and please, call me either just Garcia or Penelope," she told the doctor with a slight smile.

"Penelope, I know you saw Jane's wounds briefly in the ER, but if you will be caring for her you should see them again as well. Would you like to stay?"

"Yes, I guess…" She said, almost in a whisper.

"All right then, let's get started." Dr. Adams gave Jane a small booster shot of pain medication in her IV before beginning; she didn't want her to start waking up in the middle of the procedure.

Once the additional pain medicine was administered, one of the nurses raised Jane's gown up and over her right hip and stomach and exposed the branding. Once it came into view, Hotch sucked in his breath, it looked horrible! Garcia was standing next to him on the left side of the bed and when the branding came into view, she clutched his hand as silent tears started down her face. They both watched as Dr. Adams and one of the nurses started scrubbing the burn. It was then that Hotch noticed the tears rolling down Jane's cheeks.

Once she was finished cleaning the burn, Dr. Adams turned to Hotch and Garcia, "I know it looks bad, but the branding is actually looking better than it did yesterday. Once Jane is awake, we will numb the branding area before debriding it. She will have some pain, but there really isn't much we can do about that."

Dr. Adams bandaged the branding and then had the nurses turn Jane over so she could examine her back. Once Jane was on her stomach, the nurses untied her gown and Hotch got his first look at his daughter's back. Once again he sucked in his breath and had to blink back tears, her back was a mess of welts and cuts. She had actual stripes on her from where Sampson had beat her with the dowel and he could tell where the metal of the belt buckle had hit her. She had bruises and welts from her upper back all the way down to her lower thighs. The nurses cleaned the wounds while Dr. Adams examined a rather large cut on Jane's back where the belt buckle had caught her skin and then dragged down for three inches.

"I debated stitching this cut up while Jane was in the ER and I had hoped it would heal on its own, but I am going to have to stitch it up so that it heals more quickly." Dr. Adams told Hotch and Garcia. She asked one of the nurses for a suture kit. While she sutured the cut, she talked to Garcia and Hotch, who were still standing next to Jane's bed, clutching each other's hands for support.

"I know this looks bad right now, but Jane is actually healing fairly well. In only a day, the IV antibiotics have managed to clear up some of the infection in her branding and while she still has a fever, that is going down as well. Her vital signs are much better and we've balanced out her electrolytes. Her latest blood work also shows that her kidney functions are improving, which is great because that means that we are doing a good job at rehydrating her."

Garcia and Hotch were able to give small smiles at the fact that Jane was slowly getting better. Dr. Adams finished stitching up the cut on Jane's back and had the nurses re-tie her gown and turned her over onto her back. Once she was on her back, Dr. Adams undid the bandage over the bullet wound on Jane's arm and examined it.

"Even the bullet wound looks better, the infection has lessened. I know it looks horrible to you right now because of the redness and sutures, but it really does look better than yesterday." She told them.

"Will she have any permanent muscle or nerve damage from the bullet wound?" Hotch asked.

"No, it was a deep graze, but only a graze. Other than a scar, Jane should have no lasting effects from it." Dr. Adams told him, re-bandaging the wound. "Because Jane is healing so nicely, I would like to begin waking Jane up from her medicinal sleep. I will still give her enough pain medicine to keep her comfortable, but she will be conscious. She needs to begin eating again and she needs to begin her psychological recovery. The longer she stays asleep like this, the more disoriented she will be when she wakes up."

"Do what you think is best, Dr. Adams. I just want to be sure that Jane won't be in agonizing pain when she wakes up." Hotch said.

"She will have some discomfort from time to time, but I will make sure that any pain she has is manageable." Dr. Adams told him. "Do either of you have any other questions or concerns?"

"There is one thing," Hotch said, "I don't plan on being away from Jane for very long while she's here, but if I am not here I would like it noted in Jane's chart that Penelope Garcia and David Rossi are authorized to make medical decisions for Jane on my behalf."

Garcia turned and just stared at Hotch. "Are you sure about this, Hotch?" She asked him.

"Penelope, there is no one that I trust more with Jane's well being than you, you should know that by now." He told her.

"I will make sure it is noted in her chart." Dr. Adams said.

**********

All there was for Jane was sleep. Dead, black , sleep. She was grateful for it as it took over her body in the ER the day she was brought in.

Once the pain medicine began being tapered off though, the nightmares started. She dreamed she was back in that horrible basement, her kidnapper coming at her with his pants unzipped and this time not stopping just because she was a kid. She dreamt that he raped her, that he shot her, that her father arrived and she watched as the kidnapper killed him. She would wake up screaming and gentle hands would grip hers and she would hear voices tell her that everything was all right and she would fall back asleep.

The worst nightmare occurred late the second night. She dreamt that the kidnapper had that come back into her room with that horrible branding iron again and he was going to brand every inch of her body. She sat up in bed, her arms flailing wildly as she screamed and cried.

Hotch had been lightly dozing in the chair next to her, having ordered the rest f the team, including Garcia, back to the hotel to get some sleep, when he heard the loud scream come from Jane. He watched as she sat up and tried to fight off an invisible intruder, crying the whole time. The look of terror on her face was heartbreaking. Hotch jumped up and encircled his arms around her, holding her arms against her body as he tried to wake her up. She wouldn't come out of her nightmare and as he rang for a nurse, he tried the last weapon in his arsenal to try to get her to calm down; he began to sing to her.

Even in her nightmare, Jane was aware of her father's voice. She felt strong protective arms around her and she heard her father order her to wake up. She wanted to obey, but part of her wondered if it was a trick that her kidnapper was playing on her. She still struggled, not wanting to give in, not wanting to be hurt by him again when she suddenly heard singing. She quieted as she heard her father sing _The Rainbow Connection_ softly to her. There was no way that the kidnapper would know that her parents used to sing this song to her when she was younger; this meant that she might actually be safe. She slowly opened her eyes and looked around and realized she was in a hospital room. Just as she was making that connection, a nurse came into her room.

"Is there something wrong? I heard your call button just as I saw a spike in Jane's heart rate." The nurse said.

"My daughter is awake but she had a nightmare and I'm afraid she might have pulled some of her stitches," Hotch said.

"I will check them for you." The nurse said as she began checking Jane's arm. Hotch moved back to his chair as the nurse checked the stitches on Jane's back. "Everything looks fine here, Agent Hotchner. I'll let Dr. Adams know that Jane is awake. I know it's late, but she is still here working on some paperwork." The nurse bustled out of the room to page Dr. Adams.

Jane turned to her father, "What time is it?" She asked in a raspy voice.

Hotch got up to pour her a glass of water from the pitcher next to her bed. "Twelve-thirty in the morning." He told her, handing her the water.

Jane's hand shook as she took it. "When…what day…how long have I been here?" She asked, taking a long drink.

"You've been here almost two days, sweetie. They wanted to keep you asleep to help with your pain and to help you heal."

Jane thought for a minute, she couldn't believe she had slept for almost two whole days. Then she was stricken with another thought.

"Where's the kidnapper? What happened to him? Did you catch him, can he get me again?!" She asked Hotch frantically.

Hotch, seeing the terrified look on Jane's face, engulfed her in a gentle hug. "Sampson, your kidnapper, is dead, sweetie. He can't hurt you anymore." Hotch felt the way Jane's body went rigid when he called her sweetie.

"Dead? Really?" Jane asked him, almost scared to believe that she might be safe.

"Really," he said, as Dr. Adams came into the room.

As Dr. Adams approached Jane's bed, Hotch moved back to his chair again. "Jane, it's good to see you awake. How are you feeling?" She asked.

Jane gave a feeble smile, "Not so great, I feel like crap but not just from the pain. Am I sick or something?"

"In a manner of speaking," Dr. Adams said, "some of your wounds are infected and that's causing you to run a fever. That's also why we have you hooked up to the heart monitor. How's your pain?"

"Um, not good…my side…my branding I guess, is really hurting and so is my nose, and it _really _hurts to take a deep breath." She didn't want to sound like she was whining, but she couldn't help but complain a little.

"How about the rest of you? How does the rest of your body feel?" Dr. Adams asked.

"Achy, just _really_ achy." Jane said.

"OK, I'm going to give you another shot of pain medicine now-"

Jane interrupted her, "No, I don't want to sleep for another two days!"

"The medicine will be a lower dosage, just to get you through the night. We'll talk again tomorrow morning and re-evaluate your pain. If you are doing all right, we can lower your dose even further, or switch you to an oral pain medicine. OK?"

"OK." Jane relented.

"I'll have a nurse come in and give you the shot. I'll see you in the morning and we'll talk." Dr. Adams said as she left the room.

After Dr. Adams left, Jane looked over at Hotch sitting in the chair next to her bed. "How is it that I was beaten for four days and yet you still look worse than I do?" She asked him, smiling slightly.

He returned the smile, "I am so glad you're awake sweetie," he saw her face darken again at the term of endearment. "Is there anything I can get you?" He asked.

"No, I'm fine. Seriously dad, when was the last time you got some sleep?" She asked him.

"Don't worry about me Jane, I should be the one worrying about you." He said, unable to hold back a really big yawn.

Jane snorted when she saw him yawn, and then felt the pain of the snort in her broken nose and grimaced.

Hotch saw it and immediately asked, "What? What is it? Where are you feeling pain?" He was ready to hit the call button for the nurse when he felt her hand cover his.

"It's nothing dad, my nose just hurt when I snorted. What's wrong with it anyway?"

"It's broken." He told her.

That took Jane by surprise. "Jesus, really?" Hotch nodded.

"What else is wrong with me?" She asked, on the verge of tears.

"We'll sit down with Dr. Adams tomorrow and discuss your injuries sweetie," he saw her look away as he again used her nickname. "Right now you need to sleep."

"Pots and kettles dad, you should go home and get some sleep yourself." She told him.

"That is an _excellent_ idea Jane," Derek piped up from the doorway.

"Morgan, what are you doing here?" Hotch asked him.

"I never left, Hotch." He replied, blowing on his cup of coffee.

"I thought I ordered everyone back to the hotel to sleep?" Hotch was slightly angry that his orders were ignored.

"You did," Derek said calmly, "but since you're on a leave of absence, you really don't have the authority to give me orders. Besides, _I've_ gotten some sleep in the last six days." He gave Hotch a pointed look.

"Seriously dad, once they give me that shot, I'll be out until the morning. Go get some sleep," she could see he was about to argue with him, so she played the guilt card. "Knowing that you've gotten some rest will make me feel better dad. Don't you want me to feel better?"

Derek grinned and stood back to watch Jane play her father. He thought that Jane would make a great profiler some day.

Hotch thought for a minute, "I don't want to leave you alone Jane."

"Hey! What am I, chopped liver? I'll be here with her." Derek told him.

Hotch finally relented. "Ok, I'll go get a couple of hours of sleep, but call me if anything changes, Derek."

"Dad, I love you, but I don't want to see you here until eight o'clock at the earliest.-" Jane could see he wanted to argue with her and kept talking, "Seriously, I'm already in pain. Do you want me in pain and pissed off?"

"Not at all," he said as leaned down to kiss her cheek. "Sleep well sweetie. I love you."

"Love you too dad, now will you get out of here?" She said with a small smile.

Hotch left the room just as the nurse was walking in with the shot of pain medicine for Jane.

Jane, relieved to be getting some relief from her pain, talked to Derek for a minute before falling asleep.


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 11

* * *

Dave was surprised to see Garcia in the hotel restaurant the next morning. It was six-thirty and she was there doing a crossword puzzle. She was fully dressed and it looked to Dave like she hadn't slept much the night before.

"Fancy meeting you here." He said to her as he sat down at her table.

Garcia looked up, "Good morning, Dave. Sleep well?"

"Not really, you?"

Garcia sighed, "I tried, but the images from the webcam keep replaying in my head every time I closed my eyes."

"About that Garcia, I've gone ahead-" Dave stopped in mid sentence as he saw Hotch enter the restaurant and head towards them.

"Hotch; I didn't expect to see you here." Dave said as Hotch sat down at their table.

"I didn't expect to be here. Jane woke up at around midnight and kicked me out of her room. She pulled a guilt trip on me to get me to come back here to sleep." Hotch told them, with a slight smile on his face.

The waitress came by their table to take their breakfast orders. Hotch tried just ordering coffee so he could get back to the hospital quicker, but both Penelope and Dave insisted that he order some real food. They all ended up getting eggs, bacon, hash browns and pancakes.

While they waited for their food, Dave let Hotch know that Sampson also had a security camera in his workroom and that Hotch's shooting of Sampson had been recorded. The higher ups at the bureau had reviewed the tape and declared the shooting to be justified. Hotch was relieved that he wouldn't have to go through a long, drawn-out hearing.

Once their food arrived, the three of them said very little, all of them hungrier than they thought. After the waitress cleared their plates, Hotch started to get his stuff together so he could get back to the hospital.

"I pushed everyone's wake-up calls back an hour and I texted them as well. Dr. Adams wants to meet with Jane and I at eight o'clock to discuss her injuries, so I let the rest of the team know not to get there until nine o'clock at the earliest. Since I've authorized both of you to make medical decisions for Jane, I would like it if you would attend the meeting."

"No problem, Hotch." Garcia said.

"I don't know, Hotch, I have a ton of paperwork to finish and some other things to do. I will try to make it, if I can." Rossi said.

"Sure thing, Dave." Hotch said as he left the table.

Garcia waited until Hotch left the restaurant before she turned to Dave and said, "What the hell was that?"

"What?"

"You don't have to be a profiler to know that you are avoiding seeing Jane. You haven't been in her room once since she was admitted and now you want to blow off a meeting with her doctor? What gives?" Garcia asked him, confused.

Dave sighed, "I can't face her yet, Garcia. Until I can get a handle on my own guilt, I think it would be better if I didn't see her."

"Guilt? Why do you feel guilty?" She asked him.

"Christ Penelope, this team has been able to work miracles for total strangers, yet when I take the lead we can't track down someone who kidnapped one of our own! Not to mention that he was holding her captive only about 15 miles from where we were. I screwed the pooch on this case! If I had been a better leader, maybe we would have found her sooner and she wouldn't have as many injuries." Dave told her.

Garcia stared at him for a moment, "You really think that Jane's injuries are your fault? Are you a moron?" Dave tried to interrupt, but Penelope kept talking. "You're a great leader; this was just a shitty case. Think about it Dave, we didn't catch any breaks on the case until his computer software went down. You shouldn't blame yourself; I guarantee you that Jane doesn't blame you."

"Thanks, Garcia." Dave said, unconvinced.

"That having been said, you should come to the meeting with Jane's doctor. If you are going to be making medical decisions for her, you need to be up to date on her condition." Garcia told him.

Dave thought for a minute, "I'll be there Garcia."

"Good."

They both sat in silence for a minute, contemplating the upcoming meeting, when they were interrupted by the hotel's concierge.

"Excuse me Mr. Rossi, but this just came for you by courier." He handed Dave a package.

"Thanks Stephen." Dave said, tipping him. Dave saw the return address on the package and grinned as he opened it.

"It's kinda early for deliveries, isn't it Dave? What did you get?" Garcia asked him.

He kept smiling, "Remember when this case first started, how I told you that I would help you regain the part of yourself that you were afraid you would lose by watching the video feed of Jane being beaten?"

"Vaguely," Garcia told him.

"Well Penelope, I know this won't completely restore the part of you that you lost, but I'm hoping it will help." With that, he slid a folder towards her.

"What is _this_?" She asked him, looking through the contents of the file.

"This, my technical goddess, is a 10 day cruise around the Hawaiian Islands for you and Kevin. I know that you are planning to help take care of Jane, but the cruise isn't until early November so Jane should be well along in her recovery by then." Dave watched Garcia, who was looked shocked, and kept going. "I also arranged for a four day layover in LA on the way to Honolulu so you can visit the happiest place on earth; Disneyland. Hopefully a couple of days with Mickey will help restore some of the happiness in your life."

Penelope could count on one hand the number of times she had been struck speechless in her life; this was one of those times. "Oh my…you didn't…you didn't have to do all of this, Dave." She said, her eyes moist.

"I know I didn't _have_ to, I _wanted_ to. You had the shittiest job of all of us during this case Garcia, and you deserve some relaxation." Dave told her.

Garcia stared down at the tickets, "You booked us a deluxe suite for the cruise?!" She squealed.

"Nothing but the best, you're going first class all the way, Penelope. Oh and don't worry about getting the time off for this trip, I've already spoken to Strauss and she approved the time off for both you and Kevin."

"Thank you _so_ much, Dave!" Garcia said, leaning over to kiss his cheek.

"Thank _you _Penelope, for all that you did to bring Jane home." Dave told her.

**********

Hotch arrived at the hospital at seven-fifteen. He got to Jane's room and found her awake, talking to Derek.

She looked at the clock when he walked in, "Seven-fifteen, that's pretty good. I know I said I didn't want to see you here before eight, but honestly, I expected you to be back at around six o'clock. Did you get some sleep?"

"I got enough," he told her as he kissed her cheek, "what are you doing up?"

"Nightmares. My pain medicine wore off and I couldn't get back to sleep." She told him.

"Your pain medicine wore off? Have you gotten some more?" Hotch asked her.

"Yes, I got some oral stuff so I wouldn't be as groggy. I know we're meeting with Dr. Adams this morning and I want to be able to pay attention to what she says."

"Ok, but if your pain gets too bad I want you to get some of the good pain medicine." Hotch told her.

"As long as you're here Hotch, I'm going to go back to the hotel and get a couple of hours of sleep. I'll see you later, Little Hotch." Derek said.

"See you later Morgan, and thanks for staying with her." Hotch said.

"Not a problem, boss." Derek told him as he left the room.

Jane and Hotch sat in silence for a little while, both watching the _Today Show _that was playing on Jane's TV. Then Hotch watched as Jane shifted position in her bed and winced.

"What is it sweetie? Do you want more pain medication?" Hotch asked her, getting ready to ring for a nurse.

"No, I'm OK dad, I don't want more medicine, all it will do is put me back to sleep." She told him.

Hotch stared at her for a moment, "I am _so_ sorry, Jane." He said softly.

Jane looked confused, "Sorry? What are you sorry for?"

"If it wasn't for me and my job, this never would have happened to you. Your injuries, your kidnapping…it's all my fault." He said, his eyes wet.

"It is _not_ your fault dad." Jane said.

"It _is _my fault! This was always your mother's and my biggest fear, that someone would come looking for me and would use you to get revenge. Well, I'm not going to let this happen again, I am quitting the FBI and I am going to go into a safer line of work." Hotch told her.

"Are you crazy?" Jane asked him, "This is not your fault! This guy didn't go after me because you're an FBI agent, he went after me because you prosecuted him when you were an attorney. You didn't actively seek this guy out, the case was assigned to you!"

"How do you know all of this?" He asked her.

"Derek told me. I asked him about the kidnapper and he told me, and don't change the subject! If you want to quit the FBI because you can't handle it anymore, or you don't like it anymore then fine, but don't quit because of this! If you do, then Sampson wins. He already fucked with the trajectory of my life, don't let him fuck with yours too."

"You really don't blame me?" Hotch asked her, allowing some hope to grow within him.

"Of course I don't. This probably would have happened regardless of your work with the FBI, but it's your job that helped save me. There is no way that any other team would have gotten to me before Sampson killed me." She paused, looking at her dad, seeing the tears in his eyes. "Dad, don't feel guilty over this, OK? I will never blame you for any of this. Sampson tried to get in my head and tried to get me to hate you, but it didn't work. I love you, you big goof!"

Hotch felt like a huge weight had been lifted from him. He would always feel guilty about Jane's kidnapping, but he was relieved that _she _didn't blame him for it. He got up and embraced Jane in a gentle hug and then sat back down in the chair next to her bed.

"You know what really sucks about this whole thing?" Jane asked him.

"No, what?"

"I am stuck watching daytime TV. Daytime TV is the worst!" She exclaimed.

Hotch smiled and they watched TV together until seven forty-five when Melody Ventner walked into Jane's room.

"Mel!" Jane exclaimed.

"Jane!" Mel said, giving her a hug. She stood back and looked at Jane. "God Jane, you look like shit!."

Hotch mentally winced; Mel was not one to hold back, she always said what was on her mind. Hotch waited for Jane's reaction and to his relief she gave Mel a big grin.

"Thanks a ton, Mel." Jane said sarcastically. "I'll have to fire my stylist immediately. You sure don't look too bad, is that a hickey?!" Jane asked, staring at Mel's neck.

"Hey, you were missing! I needed comfort and fortunately my honey was willing to provide it. Everyone had to deal with your kidnapping in their own way." Mel said with a grin, and then realized that Hotch was still in the room, listening to every word they were saying.

"Oh, hi Mr. Hotchner." Mel said, turning tomato red.

"Hi Mel." Hotch said, fighting down a grin. Watching Mel interact with his daughter, he realized that this was exactly what Jane needed. It was the first time since this whole thing began that he saw Jane relaxed and genuinely happy. "What did I tell you about the whole "Mr. Hotchner" thing?

"Sorry, I meant 'hi Aaron.'" Mel said with a smile.

"That's better." Hotch said, with a mock scowl.

"What are you talking about, when did you tell her to call you Aaron?" Jane asked.

"Mel came to headquarters to talk to me the day you were taken. She wanted to know what was going on." He told her.

Jane looked at Mel, "You got into the 'inner sanctum?' I'm impressed; I think you're the only friend I've ever had that has gotten into dad's office at Quantico."

Mel grinned, "Who are you kidding, I'm your only friend," she said teasingly, "and it wasn't just me, Andy also got into his office since he came with me."

Jane looked down, "How is Andy? He didn't come with you?"

Mel sighed, "He's having a hard time dealing with this, Jane. He thinks that he should have been able to protect you from this. He feels guilty for not being there for you."

"Would you tell him that I want to see him? I want him to feel comfortable about coming here, but I don't want him to think that I blame him, because I don't."

"I'll pass along your message." Mel said as Garcia and Rossi came into Jane's room.

"Hi Penelope!" Mel said, giving Garcia a hug. Mel knew Garcia well since she took care of Jane so much when Hotch was out of town.

"Dave!" Jane said, seeing her godfather.

Dave came up and gave Jane a hug and kissed her cheek. "How are you doing, honey?"

"I'm OK, Dave." Jane said.

"That's glaringly obvious," Mel said, "that's the first thing I thought when I walked into your room, 'well Jane looks OK.'" Mel said, sarcastically.

Everyone in the room laughed at that. "Don't you have to get to school, Mel?" Hotch asked her.

"Yeah, I wouldn't want to ruin my perfect punctuality record." The only time Mel was ever on time for school was when she rode in with Jane, otherwise she was _always _at least ten minutes late.

Hotch gave her a look. "Yeah, yeah, I'm going, but before I go I have to give Jane her care package." Mel reached into her tote bag and started pulling out items. "This is dry shampoo. I figured with your injuries, they probably won't let you shower for a few more days, so this will keep your hair somewhat clean." She set the bottle down on the bedside table. "This is some lip balm that can also double as lip gloss, and_ this_ is my iPod. I heard yours broke when you were taken so I figured since we both have pretty much the same music on our iPods, I would _loan_ you mine. Don't get any ideas about keeping it, Hotchner; I want it back as soon as _someone_ gets you a new one." She said, giving pointed looks to both Aaron and Dave.

Jane was touched, she knew that Mel didn't loan her iPod to _anyone_. "Thanks Mel," Jane said, with tears in her eyes.

"Anything for you, Jane," Mel said as she gave her a hug goodbye.

Hotch walked Mel out of Jane's room. Once she hit the hallway, Mel started crying softly. "God Aaron, she looks terrible. Will she really be OK after this?"

Hotch hugged her, "I hope so Mel, we're meeting with her doctor in a few minutes to find that out. I can tell you though, your visit really helped raise Jane's spirits. I hope you will visit as much as you can."

"Count on it, sir!" With that, Mel left to go to school and Hotch returned to Jane's room.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter12

* * *

An hour later, Jane was trying to absorb all that Dr. Adams had told her about her injuries, she got basically the same briefing as the team did in the ER. Jane couldn't believe that so many things were wrong with her, that she had been so hurt. She knew she was lucky to be alive.

"So that was your condition when you were first brought in here, but I can tell you that I anticipate you making a full physical recovery, it just might take awhile. The sleep you have gotten, combined with the pain killers and antibiotics have helped to improve your general overall status." Dr. Adams told her, "I can tell you that as of this morning, your kidney function has improved significantly-" Jane interrupted her.

"Yeah, about that," Jane interrupted, "since my kidneys are doing better, can I get rid of this catheter? It is _really _uncomfortable."

Dr. Adams thought about that for a minute. "I'm going to have a nephrologist review your chart and if he says the catheter can be removed, we'll remove it. I would hate to remove it and then have to re-insert it."

Jane shuddered, "Yeah, I would hate for that to happen too. Can you also take this heart monitor off of me? I feel like I can't move with it on; every time I do, one of the sticky things falls off and a nurse comes running in to make sure I didn't die."

Dr. Adams smiled and agreed to have the heart monitor removed and then continued, "The cuts and welts on your back are healing nicely. I had to stitch up a rather deep cut in your back, but otherwise everything else is all fairly shallow. Your branding is also looking better, but we will still need to debride it daily for the next few days. You will have scars from your injuries, but you can discuss that, along with your nose, with the plastic surgeons."

"Yay," Jane said flatly, "more doctors."

Dr. Adams chuckled, "Yes, I'm afraid you will be seeing many more doctors before you leave here, Jane. I am going to have nephrology, pulmonology and plastics come see you today and then tomorrow you'll see a neurologist and a psychologist-" Jane interrupted her again.

"Psychologist? Why? I am _not_ crazy from this." She said firmly.

"It's standard in cases like this, you're going to need some help dealing with everything that has happened to you." Dr. Adams told her.

"I'm fine, I don't need a shrink!" Jane said emphatically. Hotch, who was sitting next to Jane's bed, was surprised by this. If his daughter thought she wasn't going to go to therapy after her ordeal, she had another thing coming.

Dr. Adams backed down, "OK Jane, we'll hold off on the psych consult for a few days."

Jane let out a breath, "Thanks doc." She really liked Dr. Adams. She liked the way the doctor thought about her input, encouraged questions and talked directly to her, not to her father or Dave or Penelope.

Dr. Adams looked at the rest of the group. "Does anyone else have any questions for me?"

Dave piped up, he was sitting in a chair in the corner of Jane's room. "You said that someone from pulmonology will be evaluating Jane, why is that?" Dave knew that pulmonologists were doctors who specialized in conditions of the lungs and respiratory tract. He wondered if something else could be wrong with Jane.

"Because of her bruised and broken ribs, Jane is not breathing as deeply as she normally would and that can sometimes lead to pneumonia. I didn't hear any fluid in her lungs when I listened to them earlier this morning, but since she is already battling an infection combined with her other injuries, I would like pulmonology to monitor her as well. Better safe than sorry."

Hotch was reassured that such a capable and caring woman was taking care of his daughter. The first thing Penelope did the first night was run a check on Dr. Adams. They learned that she was considered one of the best trauma doctors in the DC area and they were all encouraged by that. "Why are you waiting another day for a neurologist to examine Jane? With her concussion, isn't that something you would like evaluated right away?" He asked her.

"Normally it is, but Jane just awoke from almost two days of sedation; she is going to be slower than normal and groggy until all of the drugs are out of her system. She will also be on pain killers which will make the recovery slower. Because of that, if they were to evaluate her today, neurology would not get an accurate assessment of Jane's neurological capabilities. Basically, there would be a larger chance for a misdiagnosis." Dr. Adams told him.

"How much longer will I be stuck here? When can I go home?" Jane asked.

"That depends on how quickly you heal. I would guess that you will be in the hospital for another week."

"A week?!" Jane said, "I am going to be _so_ behind in school!"

"Well, you're not going to be going back to school for awhile after that, I would anticipate returning to school at the end of October." Dr. Adams told her.

"The end of OCTOBER?! No, no way, nuh-uh!" Jane said loudly. "It's the middle of September now! There is no WAY I'm going to miss over a month of school." Jane said, trying to cross her arms over her chest, but wincing as the pain from her bullet wound, the bruises on her chest and her broken ribs made it impossible. She chose to glare instead. Penelope had to hide a grin when she saw Jane glaring; it was scary how much she looked like her dad.

"Jane, you are going to be recuperating for quite awhile, not to mention you will be having various plastic surgeries over the next month and a half. It is of course up to you and your father as to when you return to school, but I would advise you to take it slowly." Dr. Adams said.

There was silence for a minute and then Dr. Adams started talking again. "Since there don't seem to be any more questions, I have one. How is your pain today Jane?"

Jane thought for a minute, "On a scale of 1-10? Probably about a seven."

"Right now you are on oral pain killers. Would you like to stay on these or would you like to return to the injectable kind?"

"I would like to keep on the pills, they make me feel less fuzzy." She said.

"Jane, if you're still at a seven for pain, take the pain shot!" Penelope said.

"I agree Jane, there is no reason for you to be in pain." Hotch told her.

Jane was torn and she looked at Dr. Adams. "How about we increase the dosage of your oral pain medications?" Dr. Adams asked her, "it should knock the pain down some more, but it won't make you as sleepy as the pain shot. Then tonight we'll give you a pain shot so you can sleep. Does that sound good to you?"

"It does, thanks Dr. Adams." Jane said, thinking it was nice to be making her own decisions about her care.

"You're welcome, Jane. I will be back to check on you at around five o'clock this evening. That will give me time to review the nephrology and pulmonology evaluations." Dr. Adams said and then left the room.

"I really am a mess, aren't I?" Jane said, with tears in her voice.

"You're alive, that's what is important." Hotch said, getting up to hug her.

"But, god…there is so much wrong with me!" Jane said, crying.

Penelope, unable to watch Jane crying, also got up to hug her. No one noticed when Dave slipped out of the room.

**********

The nephrologist visited Jane's room at around ten-thirty and pronounced her kidneys in good health. True to her word, Dr. Adams had both the catheter and heart monitor removed and Jane felt much better...freer almost. The pulmonologist came down at around eleven-thirty and didn't find any signs of pneumonia. He left Jane with a breathing meter, which was something that would help her take deep breaths. He said he wanted her to use it throughout the day because it would help ward off pneumonia.

Right after the pulmonologist left, the nurses and one of Dr. Adams' residents came in to debride Jane's branding. They gave her another pain pill and numbed the area as best as they could before starting, but it was still excruciating for Jane. Emily stayed in the room with Jane to hold her hand through the procedure, but the rest of the team, minus Dave who was at the hotel working on paperwork, could still hear her screams in the hallway. Hotch thought his heart would break, hearing his daughter scream like that.

After her debridement, the nurse brought in a tray of food for Jane. "What's this?" She asked.

"Lunch," the nurse replied, "Dr. Adams wants you to start eating again, she says it will help you recover faster. You have a bit of weight to gain back." She told her.

'Meh, there are worse things in life than to _have_ to gain weight,' Jane thought as the nurse left. She took the cover off of the tray to see what she was getting for lunch. There was chicken ala king over mashed potatoes, red jello and a bottle of juice. She tried some of the mashed potatoes. Blech!

"God, this is disgusting!" Jane said. She normally _loved_ mashed potatoes, but these were just gross. They were the consistency of wall paper paste and they had no flavor.

While no one said it out loud, the rest of the team agreed with her, it looked disgusting!

"Well as long as you're eating your lunch Jane, we should all probably go grab something too." Derek said.

"That sounds like a great idea, why don't you all go and get something? Henry usually eats later in the day, so Will, Henry and I will stay with Jane while you all go out and then we'll grab something when you get back." JJ said.

"You know, you can all go together if you want, I'll be fine by myself for an hour or so." Jane said.

Everyone looked at her, "Nothing doing, Jane. You're stuck with all of us," her dad said.

Everyone but JJ, Will and Henry left for lunch. While they were gone, Jane drifted in and out of sleep while Henry watched Sesame Street. During her moments of wakefulness, she couldn't bring herself to eat the horrible food in front of her.

The rest of the team returned at around two o'clock and Hotch was worried when he saw that Jane had barely touched her lunch. He couldn't blame her, but he wanted her to recover.

The team wanted to stay, but Jane could tell that it was a gorgeous day outside and she encouraged all of them to leave and enjoy the weather. After some prodding from her, everyone except Hotch left to go to a nearby park for the afternoon. Penelope didn't want to leave her, but Jane insisted.

Hotch read the new Stephen King novel while Jane drifted in and out of sleep, it was rare that he had the chance to read fiction. At one point, Jane woke up and started shifting in her bed. Hotch looked over and saw that Jane was trying to get out of bed.

"Where are you going?" He asked her, wondering if she was still asleep.

"To the bathroom." Jane responded, swinging her legs over the edge of the bed. She felt a little dizzy, but she hoped that would pass.

"Are you insane? Let me call for a nurse, they can bring you a bedpan." Hotch told her.

Jane just looked at him. "Let me tell you what's _NOT_ going to happen, dad. My legs work fine, I am not going to use a freaking bedpan if I can walk."

"Your legs may work fine, but you have a concussion and you are on pain medication. You are too dizzy to walk." Jane opened her mouth to protest, but Hotch continued on, "Don't even try lying to me about the dizziness, Jane, I can tell you are. Don't be stubborn, use the damn bedpan!"

"I'm sorry, who was it who got shot in the chest, abdomen and shoulder and still refused to use a bedpan? You were out of bed as soon as you were conscious from the surgery!" Jane argued.

Hotch looked sheepish, he had never expected that to come back and bite him in the ass, but she had a point. "OK, you can use the bathroom as long as you let me help you get there."

"Fine," Jane said. Hotch helped her stand up and waited while she got her bearings. He then helped her (and her IV pole) walk the ten feet to the bathroom. He flipped on the bathroom light and the first thing they saw was the mirror. Jane saw her reflection for the first time since the bathroom in the kidnapper's basement and she sucked in a breath. "God, is that really me?" She whispered.

Hotch felt her hand grip his tightly. "Jane-" He said, but she cut him off.

"Not now dad," she said quietly, "I don't want to hear about how I look fine…not when I can see how untrue it is." She let go of his hand and walked towards the mirror, gripping the sink tightly while she stood examining her face. She studied her face for another three or four minutes and then took a deep breath. "Well, I look better than I did when I was in that horrible basement." It was true, she did; the swelling had gone down as did some of the bruising, and the nurses had wiped the blood off of her face. Her nose looked horrible, but she had been somewhat prepared for that. She took another deep breath, turned around and faced her father.

"This is as far as you go, dad. I can handle the rest from here." She told him.

"Are you sure you-" Jane interrupted him.

"I've been going to the bathroom by myself since I was four, I can handle it." She told him with a slight smile.

"OK," Hotch said skeptically. "I'll help you back to your bed when you're done."

While Jane was in the bathroom, Hotch straightened up her room a little, not knowing what else to do, it was rare that he felt as helpless as he currently did.

Once Jane was finished, he helped her back to her bed and she slept for the rest of the afternoon.

**********

Jane woke up from a nightmare to find both Penelope and JJ trying to hold her in her bed. She dreamt that she had knocked Sampson unconscious and she was trying to get away. When she opened her eyes and saw Pen and JJ she calmed down and tried to calm her breathing down. She looked around and saw that most of the team was assembled in her room and they were staring at her. She turned red as she realized everyone had witnessed her nightmare. Penelope saw her embarrassment and kicked everyone out of the room. Once they were all out, Jane told Pen about her nightmare.

"It sounded like a doozy of a dream, sweets, but you know you're safe, right?" Pen asked her, pouring her a glass of water.

"I know, it's just the dream was so real." Jane said, as she took a long drink.

"I know they are, sweetie, I had nightmares after I was shot. The thing that helped me was talking about them, I saw a shrink for a few months afterwards and she really helped me." She said, hinting at Jane.

"That's good for you Pen, but I am _not_ talking to a shrink." Jane told her, stubbornly.

"Why? What's the problem with talking to someone?" Garcia asked, genuinely curious. She never thought Jane would have a hang up about this.

"It's not going to help to talk to a complete stranger about what happened to me, all it will make me do is relive it." Seeing that Penelope was going to question her further, Jane tried changing the subject. "Where's my dad?"

"That's a good question," Pen told her, "He's planning on staying here tonight, so I think he went back to the hotel to shower. I can ask Dave for you, he's in the waiting room."

"No, that's OK." Jane said, distracted.

"What's on your mind, sweets?" Pen asked her, concerned.

"Is…is Dave mad at me or something?" Jane asked her softly, with tears in her voice. "He's never here when everyone else is, in fact, I think the only time he's been in my room was when we were talking to Dr. Adams this morning and even then I could tell he didn't want to be here. Is he mad at me for getting kidnapped? I mean, I don't blame him, I should have fought back or tried to get away or something, but I -" Penelope couldn't take anymore of Jane blaming herself for Dave's avoidance of her.

"Dave is _not_ mad at you, sweetie! Don't ever think for a minute that he, or _any _of us, blame you for your kidnapping!" Penelope told her, loudly. "Dave feels guilty that the team didn't find you quicker, he thinks that you could have avoided a lot of your injuries if he had been a better acting unit chief. He told me this morning that he can't look you in the eye right now because he's scared you'll blame him and even if you don't he blames himself."

Jane just stared at Garcia for a moment and then said, "Are all of the men in my life stupid?! Dad blames himself, Andy blames himself and now Dave is blaming himself. Are they all stupid or what?"

Garcia grinned, "The men in your life do seem to have a protective streak."

Jane sighed, "Can you please let Dave know that I would like to see him?"

"Sure thing," Garcia said as she spotted Reid in the hallway. "Spencer!" She called out.

Reid appeared at the door, "What's up, Garcia?" He asked.

"Stay with Jane for a minute?"

"No problem," Spencer said sitting in the chair Garcia just vacated.

"You know, I could have stayed by myself for a few minutes, Penelope." Jane told her.

"And have your father find out you were left alone? Nothing doing." Pen said as she left the room.

Penelope found the rest of the team, including Dave, in the waiting room watching TV. She grinned as she saw that the group of big, bad profilers were all enthralled by an episode of Oprah. Emily was the first to notice her.

"How is she doing, Garcia?" Emily asked, concerned about the nightmare.

"She's OK, but she's not quite ready for visitors." She told them. "Dave, can I talk to you out in the hall for a minute?"

Dave, who had been reading a book, set it and his reading glasses down and followed Garcia out into the hallway.

"What's up, Garcia?"

Penelope just looked at him. "I'll tell you 'what's up.' I just left our goddaughter in her room and she was in tears. Ask me why she was crying, Dave."

"Why was she crying, Garcia?" Dave asked, concerned but also somewhat confused.

Penelope felt her anger grow. "Because she thinks you're mad at her! She asked my why you haven't visited her, other than the conference this morning, and she could tell you didn't want to be there. She thinks you blame her for getting herself kidnapped. It's bad enough that she blames herself for not fighting back more, but now she believes that one of her favorite people is pissed at her."

"Shit," Dave said, feeling like a complete asshole, "of course I'm not mad at her! I don't blame her and she shouldn't blame herself!"

"_I_ know that and _you _know that, but _she_ doesn't know that!" Pen said loudly, and then she realized where she was and tried to calm down. "I told her you feel guilty, but I don't know if she believed it or not. She wants to see you, Dave, she asked me to come get you."

"Of course I'll go see her! I have to straighten this out with her." Dave said, starting down the hallway. He got to Jane's room and stood outside the open door, watching Jane and Spencer for a minute. They were discussing some book that Dave had never read and Jane was holding her own against the genius in the discussion. Finally Dave cleared his throat and entered the room.

"Hi Dave," Jane said, timidly. She turned to Reid, "I guess our discussion of the end of the Harry Potter series will have to wait, Spencer, I need to talk to Dave."

"Sure thing Jane." Spencer said as he got up and left the room.

Dave sat down in Spencer's chair and the two of them sat in silence for a minute.

"Dave-" Jane began.

"Jane-" Dave said at the same time.

They both looked at each other and laughed a little which broke some of the tension.

Jane began again, "Penelope told me you feel guilty about my injuries?" Dave remained silent. "You know that's _beyond_ crazy, right? I don't blame you, Dave."

Dave sighed, "We should have found you sooner, Jane. He was holding you only about 15 miles from headquarters. We should have been able to find something on the video that would have given his location away. It should _not_ have taken us four days to find you!"

"So what if it did take you four days? You found me, that's what is important." Jane told him.

"But if we had found you earlier, maybe you wouldn't have been injured like you are!" Dave said.

"Yeah and maybe if you had found me earlier, Sampson would have just killed me!" Jane almost yelled. "I'm here, Dave! I'm alive and the only reason I am is because of you and the team. _All_ of you need to stop feeling responsible for this!" Jane said.

"From what I hear, we're not the only ones who need to stop blaming ourselves for this, Jane." Dave said.

"Garcia has a big mouth," she mumbled.

"How can you possibly think this was your fault, honey?" He asked her.

"Because I should have fought back harder! I've been sparring with Derek for almost five years and yet when I faced my first real challenge, I lost! Hell, even when I was held captive, before he chained me, I should have been able to escape, but no, the one time I tried, I let myself get caught. If anything it's my fault that-" Dave interrupted her.

"Stop it. Stop it right now." Dave said sternly. "I am not going to sit here and listen to you blame yourself for this." Jane started to break in, but Dave continued. "Listen to me, you did _everything_ right, EVERYTHING! It wasn't your fault you were taken, he had chloroform, you couldn't fight back against that! And you did try to escape, we all saw that! When I heard the gunshot, and thought you were dead, I thought I would die too! You were beaten, burned and chained up, how were you going to escape from that?"

They both sat in silence for a minute. "Let's make a deal, Jane. I won't feel guilty about not finding you earlier and you don't blame yourself for any of this. Deal?"

"Deal," Jane said. She looked at Dave and smiled and realized that neither one of them was going to hold up their end of the agreement.

**********

Later that night, the team was in her room in various chairs and they were all watching a movie. There had been a lively discussion over which movie to watch, but Jane won out in the end with _28 Days Later_. Jane normally hated horror movies, but she _loved_ zombie movies, even if they did scare the hell out of her.

They were in the middle of the movie when the nurse brought her supper tray into her room. After she left, Jane tentatively took the cover off and looked at her meal. Just looking at it made her nauseous and the smell was even worse.

"Ugh, why would a hospital even _try_ to make stuffed green peppers?" She asked everyone, looking at the soggy pepper that was filled with rice and ground beef and some kind of sauce. She pushed her tray away and said, "There is NO way I'm eating that."

"You have to eat, Jane." Hotch said, gearing up for an argument. Jane was a picky eater under the best of circumstances, the questionable hospital food wasn't making her pickiness any easier.

"Dad, I _can't_ eat that, it's disgusting! It shouldn't even be called food." Jane said, stubbornly.

"I couldn't agree with you more, Jane," said a voice from the doorway.

**********

_Sorry it took so long for me to update this, I think my muse has been overwhelmed by all of my papers for school!_


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 13

* * *

"Uncle Sean!" Jane exclaimed.

"Hi Jane, how are you doing?" Sean said, as he set a bag down next to the door. He came in and gave her a kiss on the cheek. 'God, she looks terrible,' he thought to himself.

"Sean, it's good to see you." Hotch said, doing the handshake/hug thing that guys always seem to do.

"It's good to see you too Aaron, although I wish I was here for a happier event." Sean said and then exchanged pleasantries with the rest of the team.

"What are you doing here, Uncle Sean?" Jane asked from her bed.

"What, can't an uncle come and visit his favorite niece in the hospital?"

"Uncle Sean, I'm your _only_ niece." Jane said, somewhat sarcastically.

"True…well, Dave called me the other day and let me know what had happened and I thought I would come and see for myself that you're OK. I also may have brought some food with me," he said, with a smile.

"I don't know if Jane can eat anything that's brought in." Hotch said, his brow furrowing. He didn't see why she shouldn't be able to eat the food, but hospitals were so picky about that kind of thing. He wondered if Dr. Adams was still around so he could ask her.

As if reading his mind, Dave piped up, "It's OK Hotch, I caught Dr. Adams in the hall earlier and asked her if Jane could eat outside food and she said it was fine, the main thing is she wants Jane to eat, she doesn't care what it is."

"I asked Dave not to say anything to you about my coming because I didn't know if or when I would be able to get away from the restaurant, but I have someone covering for me for the night and possibly tomorrow." Sean told them, "I actually got into town early this afternoon, but I went to your house to do some cooking first."

"How did you get in?" Hotch asked, envisioning his brother breaking a window to get into the house.

"The last time I was out here, you gave me a key and I forgot to give it back. Lucky for me, you didn't change the locks. So once I was inside, I started cooking." With this, Sean just looked at Aaron.

Hotch, not comfortable under the gaze of his brother, finally asked, "What?"

"Bro, seriously? You need to take a cooking class or something; all of that processed crap in your freezer isn't good for you or Jane. The only things in there that looked remotely edible were leftovers of what I am sure was Jane's cooking." He told his older brother and chuckled as Hotch tinged red with embarrassment. Sean continued, "So anyway, I wanted to keep it simple for Jane, so I cooked up some turkey and mashed potatoes with gravy." With that, he pulled out some large Tupperware containers. Jane started salivating just looking at them. "If I had known that everyone was going to be here, I would have made a lot more. Sorry guys." Sean said to the rest of the team, apologetically.

"Don't worry about it, Sean." Jason said, "In fact, I think the rest of us will head out for dinner and then call it a night. We'll be back to see you tomorrow, Jane."

The rest of the team got up, said their goodbyes and left for the night. After everyone left, Sean started spooning the hot meal onto the plates he had brought. There was silence as the three of them enjoyed the meal.

Jane finally broke the silence, "You know what would have sucked about dying?" She asked the two of them.

"What?" Sean asked her, seriously.

Jane grinned, "Never getting to eat food like this again! Seriously Uncle Sean, this is SO good. Can I have some more?" She asked, holding out her plate. Both Sean and Aaron smiled, happy that she finally had an appetite. Sean put more on her plate and then looked at the TV. "What are you watching? Is this 28 Days Later?" Sean asked enthusiastically.

Hotch groaned, he forgot that his little brother loved zombie movies as much as his daughter did. He had hoped that once Sean had arrived they would be able to turn on something else, or even turn the TV off altogether. It didn't look like that was going to happen anytime soon, as Jane was rewinding the movie so she and Sean could watch from the beginning.

An hour later, the nurse came in to give Jane her pain shot and twenty minutes after that, she was out like a light. Sean noticed that Jane had fallen asleep and started talking quietly with Aaron.

"Fuck Aaron, she looks horrible! Is she going to be OK?" Sean asked him.

Hotch sighed and rubbed his eyes tiredly, "The doctor said she should make a full physical recovery. She's going to need plastic surgery for her nose and her branding-"

"Branding?! Are you serious?" Sean said, paling.

"Yeah, unfortunately I am, and I watched it happen live." Aaron told him, shuddering at the memory. Seeing the look on his brother's face, Hotch realized that Sean didn't know much about the kidnapping. He quickly filled him in and waited for his reaction.

Sean, after hearing about the whole kidnapping ordeal, paled even further. "Jesus Christ, I don't know how either of you survived that."

"Yeah, well…what choice did I have? Anyway, Jane is still facing plastic surgery and psychological therapy, which she's already fighting me on."

"Really, she doesn't want to talk to a shrink?" Sean asked and when he saw Aaron nod, he smiled slightly, "Well what do you expect? She's a Hotchner."

"What are you talking about? What does that have to do with anything?" Hotch asked, confused.

Sean just stared at him, "Hotchners don't ask for help." Seeing that his brother was going to interrupt, Sean pressed on, "Seriously, when Haley died, when both you and Jane watched the doctors try to revive her with CPR for twenty minutes, did you take her to therapist after that? Did you see one?"

Hotch, not liking the direction of the conversation, said, "No, but-"

Sean interrupted him, "Or when you were shot, did you see a psychologist?"

"No…"

"And you're surprised that Jane doesn't want to see one? Come on Aaron…hell, after what we went through in our childhoods, we should both be in therapy but we're not. Jane's just following in our fucked up footsteps, it's in her blood." Sean told him.

Hotch had nothing to say, Sean's reasoning made sense but he was determined to help his daughter through this and if she didn't want to see a therapist, well...then too bad for her. As her father, he would make that decision for her if needed.

Sean got up, "I'm going to head back to your house but I'll be back sometime tomorrow. Are you coming back to the house, or are you staying here?"

"I'm staying here." Hotch told him, "We all have hotel rooms nearby, take mine and avoid the drive back to the house."

"Nah, I'm going to be cooking most of the night." Aaron looked at him questioningly so Sean continued, "I'm guessing Jane's not going to be up to cooking for awhile, and god help both of you if you have to survive on your culinary skills, so I am going to cook a ton of meals and pack your freezer full of them."

"Sean, you don't have to do that." Aaron said, touched that his brother would go to so much trouble for him.

"I _want_ to, Aaron. I feel helpless as it is, I can at least do this." Sean said, and then left the room.

Hotch settled into the uncomfortable recliner next to Jane's bed and fell into fitful sleep.

**********

At around two-thirty the next morning, Penelope tiptoed into Jane's room, not wanting to wake either of the occupants. She saw that Hotch was sleeping in the chair next to Jane's bed and he was shivering so she grabbed an extra blanket from the closet and covered him. She then went to Jane's bed and stared at her for a minute, reassuring herself that Jane was alright, that she was safe. Once she was finally reassured, Penelope turned around and saw that Hotch was staring at her.

"Can't sleep?" He asked her.

"Hotch, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. I just had to see her, you know?" Garcia asked him, not telling him about the horrible nightmare she had earlier.

"I know. Why don't you settle in that other chair, that way Jane will see the both of us when she wakes up in the morning." Hotch offered.

Garcia smiled, "Thanks Hotch, I will."

**********

The next day was fairly busy for Jane. The rest of the team came by in the early morning, but now that she was on the mend, they needed to start getting back to their lives, so most of them left by about noon to go back to their homes. They all promised to visit her while she was in the hospital, but they could no longer spend 24/7 there. After the team came and left, Jane had her burn debrided and then had to meet with a psychologist Dr. Adams had sent her.

The psychologist was nice, but Jane didn't want to talk to her, she didn't want to talk to _anyone_ about what happened to her. She just wanted to forget everything that had happened and she knew if she opened up about it she would lose control and she wasn't sure if she would ever get it back. That scared her more than anything.

After the therapist spent half an hour with Jane, she realized that Jane wasn't ready to talk yet, so she left and Dave, Penelope, Hotch and Spencer returned to the room. Not long after that, Sean came to visit and he brought lunch. He had to leave right after his visit, because hadn't been able to get anyone to cover his shift at the restaurant that night, but he promised to visit again soon.

The rest of them spent the early afternoon watching movies, but by three o'clock, Jane had had enough, there were only so many movies she could take.

"Penelope, can you do me a huge favor?" Jane asked.

"What is it sweets?" Garcia asked her, noticing that she still bristled at the nickname.

"I am going to go out of my mind here, there is only so much TV I can take, and I can't take this kind of TV." After the movie ended, Hotch, Dave and Spencer had found a baseball game on TV and Jane hadn't had the heart to ask them to turn it off. As a result, the three men were engrossed in the game while Penelope knitted and Jane dozed. Jane continued, "Can you get me my laptop? And maybe my cell phone? And how about my diary?"

Garcia hesitated, "I'm not sure Jane, you're supposed to be resting. I don't think all of that would go over too well with certain people." With that, Garcia gave a pointed look in Hotch's direction.

Jane was frustrated, "I know I'm supposed to be resting, but can't I rest while checking my email? I _promise _I won't overdo it!" Garcia understood Jane's frustration, she was also feeling the effects of not readily having her computers nearby. She thought for a minute.

"I'll tell you what, the next time I see her, I'll ask Dr. Adams about it and if she gives the OK then I'll go over to headquarters and pick up your stuff. Ok?" She asked Jane.

"That's great, Pen. Thank you --wait, headquarters? What are my things doing at headquarters?" Jane asked, confused.

"Well Jane," Penelope began, hesitantly, "when you were taken, we needed to get a sense of…you know what? Why don't we have your dad explain this to you…" Penelope trailed off, hoping to pass the buck to Hotch. Unfortunately, Hotch and the other guys were enthralled with the game and were not paying attention to their conversation.

"No Penelope, how about _you _explain it to me." Jane said, getting a little angry. She knew if Penelope didn't want to explain it, it had to be bad.

"Um, so before we knew about the video feed, we were trying to figure out who the unsub was. They all thought that maybe you had met him or he had contacted you." Garcia paused.

"Go on," Jane said, still not sure where this was going.

"So, um, the team had to look through your diary and all of your online stuff to see if you ever mentioned anything about him." Garcia said this last part quickly.

Jane took a moment to absorb the information Garcia had given her and then it hit her. "EVERYONE READ MY DIARY?!" She shouted.

That got the guys attention, all three of them whipped around to look at Jane.

"Hey, what's going on? You need to settle down sweetie." Hotch said, seeing that his daughter was upset, but not knowing why.

"Did the entire team read my diary?" Jane asked him, anger radiating off of her.

Dave answered the question, "Yes we did Jane. We needed to figure out who the unsub was and the quickest way was to see if he had made contact with you, so we read your diary." In the interest of full disclosure and to avoid hassles in the future, he decided to let her know the rest. "We also combed through your laptop files, your pictures and all of the online sites you've visited or posted information to."

Jane couldn't believe this, she was mortified. It was bad enough that she had NO privacy in the hospital, what with all of the doctors and nurses coming in and examining and exposing her, now everyone she cared about knew her deepest, darkest secrets from the past year! Jane closed her eyes. "Is that all?"

"Um, well, I also read your diaries on your laptop." Hotch admitted, also thinking about avoiding a fight at a future date.

Jane wanted to die of humiliation, this just kept getting worse and worse. "Why? Why would you do that?!"

"Because I thought I would never see you again, that you would be killed and I needed to connect with you." Hotch told her.

"We needed to build a profile honey, and since we didn't have much on Sampson, we needed to build one on his victim, which was you." Dave tried explaining.

"I don't believe this." Jane said, her eyes still closed, one tear trickling down her cheek. She couldn't decide if she was more humiliated or angry.

Everyone sat there for a few minutes in an uncomfortable silence. Finally, Hotch tried breaking the silence.

"Have you used your breathing meter today Jane?" He asked, trying to change the subject.

Jane's eyes popped open, "What?" She asked, not believing the question. Here she was, totally humiliated by the people she loved most and her dad was asking her about her breathing meter? Anger won out in her emotions.

"Your breathing meter, it's important-" he started to say, but Jane interrupted him.

"Fuck the breathing meter!" She said, angrily.

Hotch stared at her for a second, "I know you're upset Jane, but that doesn't give you an excuse to be rude." He said, sternly.

Jane closed her eyes again. "You guys need to get out."

"What?" Hotch asked.

"I _said_ you all need to get out! I need some time alone to process this," she told him.

"Jane, I know you're embarrassed, but let's talk about this." Hotch really didn't want to leave her alone, but he could also see that she was _really_ pissed.

Jane, struggling to stay somewhat calm, said quietly, "I don't want to talk, I want to be by myself for a few hours."

Penelope, who could see the warning signs in Jane's facial expressions and voice, started backing towards the door, pulling Reid with her. Dave just sat back and watched, wondering where this was going to go.

Hotch, knowing his daughter was upset, tried reasoning with her. "Jane, I don't want to leave you alone-" Jane interrupted him.

"I don't care what you want! I _told_ you I want to be left alone, so get out! Ever since I was taken, I have no fucking control over what happens to me, but I can sure as hell kick you guys out of my room! Get out, get out, GET OUT!" Jane knew she was inches away from losing total control, that all of her anger over being kidnapped was about to be taken out on the people she loved the most and she knew she couldn't let that happen. Plus, someone had been with her for every single moment of every single day since she was found and she was getting a little tired of it, she really needed some time to herself to think about things.

"OK Jane, we're leaving." Hotch said, quietly. "I'll be back in time for dinner."

"_We'll_ be back in time for dinner." Garcia corrected. Spencer and Dave both nodded their agreement as the three of them left the room.

Once they were gone, Jane started taking deep breaths so she could get her emotions under control. It wasn't easy, the rational part of her understood why they went through all of her personal stuff, but the rest of her felt betrayed by the invasion of privacy. Deciding she needed to talk to someone who was somewhat neutral, she picked up the phone and called a number she knew by heart.

"Mel," she asked when her best friend picked up the phone, "do you have a minute?"

**********

Once they left the hospital, Garcia, Reid, Dave and Hotch all went their separate ways. Garcia and Reid went back to the hotel, Dave returned to headquarters to finish up some odds and ends and Hotch used the time to go back to his house and get caught up on a few things.

As he pulled into his driveway, he thought back to the last time he was here. He couldn't believe how his life and his daughter's life had changed in such a short time. Sighing, he turned off the engine and out of habit walked to the back door of the house. He sucked in his breath as he approached the door. A couple of nights of heavy rain had washed away the drag marks left by Sampson and his daughter, but the shrubbery on either side of the door had been trampled by both his team and the crime scene techs. He tried to ignore the changes near the door as he let himself inside.

As soon as he saw the kitchen, he breathed a sigh of relief. He had visions of Sean cooking and then leaving the kitchen in shambles, but he had cleaned up after himself and the kitchen was nearly spotless. He went upstairs to shower and change, but once he got to the top of the stairs he went to Jane's room and peered in. He came close to losing it again as he sat down on his daughter's bed. He looked around at all of the pictures and posters that lined her walls and wondered if she would ever be a normal teenager again. He knew she had months, if not years of recovery ahead of her and his heart broke for the girl she had been up until a week and a half ago. He vowed then that he would help her regain her sense of self, he didn't care if she fought him every step of the way, he would help her regain some normalcy in her life.

What he really wanted to do was gather up some items from her room and bring them to the hospital in order to give her a sense of comfort, but he thought it might be seen by her as another intrusion into her privacy, so he mostly left her things alone. The only thing he grabbed was a wool afghan that Haley had made Jane when she was a baby. Jane loved that afghan and frequently used it to keep warm in the house.

After his shower, Hotch went next door to the Ventners to get his mail and then he packed a tote bag with his pillow (he wanted to be a little more comfortable at the hospital), the afghan from Jane's bed, another book to read, some movies and some cards that had come in the mail for Jane. Once it was packed, he noticed that it was almost dinner time and he started towards the hospital. On the way, he picked up a new cell phone for Jane, as her old one was considered to be evidence in the case, and a new IPod for her. He hoped having some of her gadgets around her would make her feel more comfortable; she was like Garcia in that sense.

Once at the hospital, he made his way down the hallway of Jane's floor, wondering if Jane was still as mad as she had been earlier, or if they would be able to talk to her. He got to her room and looked in. Jane was in her bed and she looked terrified. Worried, Hotch quickly entered the room so he could see what was scaring his daughter so badly. He looked towards the foot of her bed, saw the person standing there and felt his blood run cold.

**********

_Sorry it's taking me so long to update this story, I haven't forgotten about it! Life keeps getting in the way of my writing._

_The site has been acting weird lately, but I posted another chapter of 'A Different Kind of Life' earlier this week. I'm not sure if it showed up on the story listings._

_Reviews?_


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 14

* * *

'No, it can't be!' Hotch thought to himself as he entered Jane's room. Anthony Sampson was standing at the foot of her bed.

As he entered the room further, Hotch realized that it wasn't Anthony Sampson, but a close relative of his. Regardless, the man had scared the hell out of him and he was currently terrifying his daughter.

"What in the hell is going on in here? Jane, are you alright?" Hotch asked, going to her. As he approached the head of her bed, he could see that she was trembling violently.

"Mr. Hotchner? I am Edward Sampson, Anthony was my brother. I was just telling your daughter how sorry I am for what happened to her-" Hotch cut him off.

"You need to leave. NOW! I don't know if you realize it, but you are scaring my daughter!" Hotch pulled Jane into his arms and she buried her face in his chest, not wanting to look at the man who looked so very much like her captor.

Sampson saw Jane and looked stricken. "Yes, of course…I'm so sorry…"

"What the fuck?!" Dave appeared in the doorway with Reid and Garcia behind him. "What in the hell is going on here?"

"This man was just leaving." Hotch said, getting up. "Garcia, Reid, please stay with Jane for a minute." Hotch asked them. Garcia immediately took over Hotch's position on Jane's bed, while he and Dave escorted Sampson out of the room.

Once they were out in the hallway, Hotch started in on Sampson, "Look Mr. Sampson, I know you were only trying to apologize, but your brother screwed my daughter up both physically and emotionally and you bear more than a striking resemblance to him. You need to leave and not contact Jane or myself again. Do you understand?"

"I do and I am so sorry...for this…and well, for everything my brother did. He wasn't always like this, when Annie killed herself he went crazy and the prison doctors never helped him." Sampson said.

"I feel for you, really I do Mr. Sampson," Hotch said, lying through his teeth, "but right now I have to do what's best for my daughter. _Don't_ try to contact her again."

"I won't."

"Good. Dave, will you please escort Mr. Sampson off of the premises?" Hotch asked, anxious to get back to Jane.

"Will do, Hotch." Dave said as he took Sampson's elbow and propelled him down the hallway.

Hotch practically ran back into Jane's room and found her crying on Penelope's shoulder. "I-I-I thought he h-had come b-b-back for me!" Jane said, stammering in fear.

Hotch stood next to Jane's bed, letting Garcia hug her while he rubbed her back. "It wasn't him sweetie, it was his brother. All he wanted to do was apologize, but you don't have to worry, he won't be back again." He could see that Jane was still trembling and he could hear the tears in her voice. "Do you want me to get someone, Jane? Maybe a doctor?"

"No, I'll be fine, just give me a minute." Jane said, pulling away from Penelope. She closed her eyes and took as deep of a breath as she could and willed herself to relax. The last thing she needed was for that shrink to come back, but Jane knew her dad would bring her back if she didn't calm down.

Finally feeling like she had a firm grip on her control, she opened her eyes and found her dad, Spencer and Pen all staring at her, concerned. Dave had come back into the room and he stood in the doorway, also staring at her.

"I'm OK guys, seriously. The brother threw me for a loop, but I'll be fine." Jane told them. "Did I see someone carrying a pizza box?" She asked, trying to change the subject.

"Oh, that's right! We figured you wouldn't mind missing the lovely hospital dinner, so we brought pizza and garlic bread." Spencer said, grabbing the paper plates from the bag and handing them out. Penelope put a slice of pizza on her plate and Dave added a piece of garlic bread.

Everyone in the room could see that Jane was still not OK and it was made more evident when she picked up her slice of pizza and her hand shook, but no one said anything, they all just picked at their pizza in silence.

Garcia finally broke the silence, "Have you processed our earlier 'discussion' Jane? How are you feeling about us reading your diary?"

Hotch mentally groaned, it wasn't tense enough in the room, what with Sampson having terrorized Jane, now they were going to have to deal with Jane's anger again? Hotch glanced around the room and realized that Dave was closing his eyes, as if to brace himself for the emotional onslaught that was coming, and Reid's eyes were huge and he was inching towards the door.

At first Jane was mad at Pen for bringing the subject back up, but when she looked around the room and saw the expressions on the men's faces, she became amused. These were some of the best minds in the country and some of the toughest guys on the planet and they were afraid of a seventeen year old girl? She bit her lip to keep from smiling and took a deep breath.

"I'm still not happy that everyone read my diary, but I understand why you did it. I'm not pissed so much as I am embarrassed." Jane told them.

"You have nothing to be embarrassed about Jane-" Hotch started, but Jane interrupted.

"Maybe embarrassed is the wrong word…violated might be closer to what I am looking for." Seeing that her dad was going to interrupt, she continued, "All of you now know all of my deepest, darkest secrets. You've read about my personal milestones, you've been privy to all of my personal thoughts and feelings and it just feels weird to me that you guys know all of this about me. I feel like I lost all of my privacy." Jane said, shakily. She was finding it harder and harder to hold on to her emotions, to her control, and she didn't like it.

"I'm sorry Jane, really I am…we had no other choice." Dave said, feeling like an asshole.

"I know you didn't, that's why I'm not mad anymore…it just doesn't help much right now," she told them.

The room was silent for a minute and then Garcia broke the silence once again. "I'll tell you what sweetie-" she noticed Jane _still_ flinched at the term of endearment, "once you're out of here and feeling like your old self again, the team will sit down with you and play 'truth' with you. It's like 'truth or dare' without the dare part. You can ask all of us anything and we will answer truthfully. Maybe that will help even things out for you."

"Really? Everyone would do that for me?" Jane asked, unbelievingly.

"Really, everyone will, even your dad." Garcia said, giving a firm look at Hotch, almost daring him to disagree with her.

"I'm going to hold you to that, Pen." Jane said.

"I hope you do, Jane." Penelope responded and then changed the subject. "Now, how about a movie? I brought _The Notebook_." She said, getting up to put it in the DVD player.

The three men in the room groaned at the thought of yet another chick flick, but they were vetoed by Jane. They got over their dismay when they saw she had started eating her pizza instead of just picking at it.

**********

Two hours later, after the movie was over, Penelope opened her tote bag and pulled out some board games. "I figured we could do with a new form of entertainment. What better way than playing classic board games?"

No one wanted to play _Scrabble_, because they knew Reid would win and no one really liked _Monopoly_, so they settled on _The Game of Life. _About midway through the game, after Jane had won the lottery, she mused out loud, "If this really is the game of life, how come they don't have anything realistic on the board? I mean seriously, how about one that says, 'your mortgage rate increased and you lose your house?' Or something like that?"

Dave smiled, "Or one that says 'your deductible goes up so your employer terminates your health insurance.'"

Everyone smiled at that one too. Then Spencer chimed in, and without thinking said the first thing that popped into his mind, "Or one that says, 'you are kidnapped and tied to a chair in a shack while a madman makes you pick someone to die, injects you with dilaudid, kills you and revives you with CPR, tortures you and almost kills you again.'" As soon as he said it, he looked stricken and the room became quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Everyone looked at Jane for her reaction.

"Jane, I'm so sorry! I shouldn't have made a joke-" Spencer started stammering.

Jane for her part was grinning, "Or one that says 'you are kidnapped and cuffed to a bed while a crazy guy beats, shoots and burns you while everyone you know and care about watches live.'"

Everyone was relieved that Jane was able to take Reid's faux pas so well. Penelope continued the dark thread. "Or one that says, 'you go out on a date with someone who you think is your dream man and he shoots you and then tries to kill you again after you get out of the hospital."

Dave laughed and continued it, "Or one that says 'you get married and divorced three times and all three times your ex-wives try to clean out your bank accounts.'"

Everyone turned and looked at Hotch for his contribution. He wasn't finding this as funny as the rest of them were, but he faked it for Jane's sake, "Or one that says, 'your wife dies of breast cancer after fourteen years of marriage and then five years later your daughter is kidnapped and you have to watch her be tortured.'"

No one thought that Hotch would actually partake in the 'alternative game of life squares' discussion, so they laughed really hard at his entry. They were all still laughing when the nurse came in.

"Time for your pain shot, Jane," the nurse said.

"No thanks, I'm going to stick with the pills tonight," she told the nurse.

Hotch frowned, "I know you're in pain sweetie, take the shot."

"No, I want to see if I can make it with just my pain pills tonight. Thanks," she said, dismissing the nurse.

"Jane, it's only been a few days since you were injured, take the shot!" Hotch told her.

"No! I don't like the way they make me feel!" She argued, sounding close to a tantrum.

Hotch was becoming frustrated, but he knew he couldn't yell at his daughter as she lay in a hospital bed. "You're in pain sweetie, the shot is to help you with the pain. There's no shame in using the shot for what it's intended."

Jane looked at him incredulously, "When you were shot you didn't take anything stronger than ibuprofen and you're telling me to take the hard drugs?! Nice try dad."

For the second time that day, both Reid and Dave started looking fearful, but Penelope was not. She stepped up to Jane's bed.

"Jane, we can do this the easy way or the hard way but either way, you're getting that shot." She told her.

Jane was intrigued, "Really? What's the easy way?" She asked.

"The easy way is we get the nurse back in here and you roll over and take the shot to the hip like a good girl. Then we finish our game, you fall asleep and wake up in the morning, hopefully in less pain." Pen told her.

"And the hard way?"

Penelope sighed, "The hard way is we get the nurse back in here, your father and I hold you down like a two year old and you get the shot anyway. The only difference is that you'll struggle, which will cause you more pain, and Dave and Reid will get to watch the whole infantile thing. Then you'll be mad at us, everyone will leave in a huff, and you won't sleep well. Which would you like?"

Jane glared at Penelope, knowing she wasn't bluffing. "Get the nurse in here, I'll take the goddamn shot!" Jane said, frustrated.

Penelope hit the call button, "Good girl," she said, patting Jane's head. Hotch just stared at the two of them, almost in awe of Penelope.

"I reserve the right to revisit the issue tomorrow night if I'm not in as much pain." Jane said.

"And I reserve the right to bully you into taking the shot if you are in _any _pain." Penelope told her.

"Whatever." Jane said, as the nurse came in and gave her the shot.

Half an hour later, Jane was asleep and everyone was making their way out of the room. Dave stopped to talk to Hotch.

"Are you sure you don't want me to stay tonight? You look like shit, Hotch. You've gotten what, like five hours of uninterrupted sleep since this whole thing began? Otherwise it's just been a couple of hours here and there. Am I right?"

Hotch sighed, "You're right Dave, but I'm staying, especially after today. I know she's going to have nightmares after Sampson's visit this evening." Hotch saw the worried look on Dave's face.

"Alright Hotch, but we'll be having this argument again if you don't get some real sleep soon." Dave warned him.

"Noted." Hotch said, trying to make himself comfortable in the chair next to Jane's bed.

Dave just sighed and left the room.

**********

Hotch was right, Jane had nightmares that night. She woke up at around 200am and then again at 430am screaming. Both times, Hotch was jolted from his sleep and he went and comforted her. After the second round of nightmares, Jane refused to go back to sleep. Instead she cuddled up in the afghan he had brought from the house, turned the on the TV and they both watched infomercials for the rest of the night.

The day passed quickly for Jane as a flurry of doctors came to see her again. It seemed that as soon as one left the room, another came to take their place. The psychologist was one of the specialists that visited her, but like the last time, Jane didn't have much to say to her.

Dave and Penelope stayed for most of the day, but the rest of the team had gone back to their regular lives and had only popped in for a few minutes. Mel visited and that raised Jane's spirits for awhile, but once she left Jane realized that her boyfriend of over a year still hadn't visited her. She chose not to reflect on that for too long.

At around five o'clock, Hotch went back to the hotel to grab a shower, promising to return for dinner. Once he was gone, Jane turned to Dave and Penelope.

"Pen, can you stay with me here tonight?" Jane asked her.

"Sure sweets, but I'm pretty sure your dad is planning on staying." Penelope told her.

"I know, but hopefully that's not going to happen." Jane said and then turned to Dave, who was watching the news. "Dave, can you do me a favor?"

"Anything, honey." Dave said.

"Good." Jane went over her plan with Dave and Penelope and they were both on board.

**********

Hotch returned to the hospital in a decent mood. While he hadn't gotten much sleep the previous night, the hot shower he had just taken had helped to relax him.

He stepped into Jane's room and saw her in conversation with Penelope and Dave. "Is this a private party, or can anyone come in?" He asked.

"Hi dad," Jane said, "Come on in."

Hotch came further into the room and kissed Jane on her forehead. "How are you feeling sweetie?"

"You mean has anything changed in the last hour since you saw me? No, I'm still doing OK." She told him.

"Glad to hear it," he said, about to sit down.

"Actually Hotch, why don't you and I grab some dinner? There's a great Italian place on Pennsylvania Ave." Dave suggested to him.

"Thanks Dave, but I think I'm going to stay here with Jane." Hotch told him.

"Actually dad, I would like some time alone with Penelope…girl talk," she told him. This was her trump card. Her dad liked to think he was open minded when talking to Jane about things like sex and her period, but she knew deep down the topics made him uncomfortable and she also knew he would defer them to Penelope if at all possible.

"Ok Jane, I'll go grab dinner with Dave, but we'll be back in an hour or two." Hotch told her as Dave led him out the door.

As soon as he was out of the room, Jane let out a sigh of relief. "I didn't know if that would actually work," she told Penelope, "God, as much as I love the guy, his constant hovering and worrying is starting to get on my nerves!"

"After seeing what you went through, you can hardly blame him." Garcia said.

"I know, that's why I haven't gone totally insane with him yet." She said.

Garcia pulled out her cell phone. "Let's see if we can get Chinese food delivered to this place."

**********

Once they got to his SUV, Dave put Jane's plan into motion. Step one was getting Hotch's cell phone.

"Hey Hotch," Dave said, getting in behind the steering wheel, "can I borrow your phone for a minute? My battery died and I want to check my messages."

"Sure," Hotch said, yawning widely as he gave Dave his phone.

Dave started driving and pretended to check his messages. He looked over and saw that Hotch was already asleep. Step two of the plan had just been achieved.

Thirty minutes later, Hotch awoke to find them driving in the middle of the woods.

"What the hell?" He said and looked at Dave. "Where are we?"

Dave made a left turn on to a gravel road. "You woke up just in time, we're at my cabin."

"WHAT? I thought we were going to dinner near the hospital?! Take me back. Now!" Hotch ordered.

"Sorry Hotch, I am under strict orders from Jane to keep you away from the hospital until at least noon tomorrow." Dave told him, as he parked the SUV in front of the cabin and cut the engine. "She's worried about you and wants you to get a good night's sleep."

"This is crazy, I'll just call a cab," he said, reaching for his cell phone.

"Looking for this?" Dave said, holding up the phone. "As you know, I don't have a landline phone here, so it's going to be virtually impossible for you to call that cab. We're also about thirty-five miles from the nearest Metro stop, so that's not an option."

"Dave, I _have_ to get back to the hospital, someone has to stay with Jane." Hotch was almost pleading with him.

"Garcia's already with her, and I have Derek coming back to spend the night as well, in case Sampson tries to talk to her again. All of the bases are covered, so why don't you try and get some sleep?"

"This is crazy-" Hotch began, but Dave cut him off.

"Hotch, this order comes directly from Jane, she's worried about you, hell we all are. She knows you haven't gotten much sleep and she feels bad about that. Just stay here tonight and put everyone's mind at ease, OK?"

"OK." Hotch said, resigned.

Both men got out of the SUV and went into Dave's cabin. They threw some steaks on the grill and had a simple meal of steaks and potatoes. After dinner, Hotch went to lie down…he was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

**********

_I am SO sorry for not posting to this story earlier. Finals and papers are coming due and I just don't seem to have enough time in the day. The bad news is that I probably won't post regularly to this story or 'A Different Kind of Life' until I get everything turned in. The good news is that I will have everything turned in by the end of next week and then I will have a lot more time to write. _


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 15  


* * *

Hotch woke up disoriented the next morning. He first wondered where he was, but as he looked around the room he remembered that he had essentially been kidnapped the night before by Dave who was acting on Jane's orders.

Jane! His second clear thought was of his daughter; he needed to check on her. His hand was halfway to the nightstand, where he usually kept his cell phone, before he remembered that Dave had taken it the day before. Damn, he really wanted to call the hospital to check on Jane…he made a mental note to get his cell phone back from Dave one way or another.

As he stood up, his third coherent thought was that he had to piss like a racehorse. He had never fully understood what that term meant until now. He heard Jane use it a few years back and he had yelled at her when he heard it, as it was crass and unladylike, but he realized now that it was an apt term. After all, he had slept for over fourteen hours straight!

After Hotch had visited the bathroom, he wandered downstairs to see what Dave was up to. He followed his nose to the kitchen where he found Dave cooking brunch.

"Sleep well?" He asked dryly.

"Yeah, I did thanks." Hotch got some coffee and saw that Dave was still staring at him. "What?"

"Maybe next time you won't let it get to the point where we have to kidnap you; maybe you'll listen to us and take our advice to get some sleep? Maybe then your daughter won't have to plan what was technically a felony."

"Yeah, maybe next time it will be easier, but hopefully there won't be a next time." Hotch said, sheepishly.

Dave, having just finished cooking breakfast, filled a plate with eggs, pancakes, bacon and fruit for Hotch and then fixed one for himself. They decided to eat out on the deck to take advantage of the beautiful autumn weather. Both men stuck to mundane topics during their breakfast conversation and Hotch was happy to be able to put Jane and her kidnapping out of his mind for a little while.

Forty-five minutes later, Hotch pushed his chair back from the table. "That was a great breakfast Dave, thanks. I'm going to jump in the shower and then we should probably head back to the hospital." Hotch started to stand, but Dave stopped him.

"Hold on Hotch, I talked to Garcia this morning and evidently they are having a "girl's day" at the hospital with Jane. Your banishment has been extended until 700pm. Actually, I've been kicked out too."

Hotch sighed and sat back down, "Did Garcia say how Jane made it through the night?

"Evidently she had nightmares all night and barely slept." Dave said reluctantly, he didn't want to add to Hotch's worries right now; he wanted the man to relax for the afternoon.

"Great, that's just great." Hotch said, frustrated. "She probably hasn't gotten more than a few hours of sleep at a time since she woke up from her sedation."

"So talk to Dr. Adams about it tonight." Dave told him. "That was the other thing Garcia told me; Dr. Adams is working a late shift tonight so she wants to meet with us to update us about Jane's status. She set the meeting up for seven-thirty tonight."

"Well…OK, that works."

"Great. Since the women are having their 'girl's day,' I invited Morgan, Reid, Kevin, Will and Henry over to watch the baseball game this afternoon. Does that work for you?"

"That sounds great Dave." Hotch said, again getting up from the table. "I'm going to jump in the shower and then I have some calls to make. Leave the dishes for me; I'll do them after I shower."

"Yeah right, try again Hotch. You're my guest, _I'll_ do the dishes." Dave told him.

An hour and a half later, Dave stepped out onto the deck where Hotch was talking on his cell phone. He heard anger in the younger man's voice and saw him angrily snap his phone shut. He looked like he was going to throw the phone into the woods, but thought better of it at the last minute.

"What's up, Hotch?" Dave asked as he passed him a beer, "You look pissed as hell."

Hotch took a long drink and then gave an angry sigh, "It's just my continuing argument with the insurance company."

Dave's eyebrows rose in surprise, "They're fighting Jane's hospitalization?"

"No…evidently they don't believe the plastic surgery for her nose and branding are necessary medical expenses, they are classifying them as elective procedures and they refuse to cover them." Hotch told him. "I don't know what I'm going to do Dave, those procedures are going to be expensive! I can't have Jane walk around with her nose uncorrected, but it means I'll probably have to dip into her college fund to pay for it." He had savings and he would use them to pay for her surgeries, but he knew it wouldn't be enough.

"You're not going to dip into her college fund and you're not going to clear out your own savings account. You are going to let me pay for the surgeries." Dave said.

Hotch stared at him for a moment. "Thanks Dave, but I can't ask you to do something like that."

"You're NOT asking me Hotch, I'm offering." Seeing that he was about to interrupt, Dave pressed on. "That little girl reignited my cold dead heart; I couldn't love her more if she was my own daughter and right now I have more money than I know what to do with. You, Jane and Penelope are family and where I come from family is the most important thing in life. Don't get me wrong, the rest of the team is family, but you three are _family._ There's a difference."

"Yeah, but Dave…" Hotch trailed off, not having a good argument against Dave paying for the surgeries, but still feeling like something was wrong with it.

"No Hotch, you are going to have enough to worry about with getting Jane healed both physically and emotionally from this, you don't need the added stress of the expense of the surgeries. Let me do this for you and for my god daughter." Dave pleaded.

Hotch thought for a minute. "OK, we'll do it your way. Thank you, thank you so much. You have no idea what a relief this is for me!"

"It's really no problem, Hotch, I'm happy to do it." Dave told him.

"So would you happen to know any good plastic surgeons?" Hotch asked, jokingly.

"Actually I do. I consulted on a case in Miami in 2005, there was some guy running around Miami cutting the faces of people he considered beautiful, he considered beauty to be a curse. Anyway, I was down there as a private consultant and I met the two plastic surgeons who were fixing the victims, free of charge. Their names were McNamara and Troy. They did great work; a month after the surgeries you couldn't tell that the victims had been cut. They were pretty decent guys too, although Dr. Troy always struck me as though he considered himself to be somewhat of a Casanova."

"That sounds great Dave, but Miami? I was kind of hoping for something closer to home." Hotch told him.

"Really Hotch?" Dave asked, "You're willing to send your daughter to a subpar surgeon to keep her closer to home? I'm telling you, these guys were great. If they can work that kind of magic with facial scars imagine what they can do for Jane's nose and branding. Not to mention any scars she may have on her back."

"Christ, I forgot about her back!" Hotch couldn't believe he forgot that.

"Don't worry about it, I'll have Garcia check into these guys…that reminds me, even though we're on stand down, the rest of the team is due to report back to the BAU on Monday. Obviously you are on an indefinite leave of absence, but I'm also putting Garcia on a reduced work schedule. That way you will have her available to help you with Jane, but she won't be overwhelmed with too much work. I'll need her all day on Monday and Tuesday to help us get back up to speed and to be present at the debriefings I'm sure we'll have to attend, but after that she'll be able to create her own schedule for awhile." Dave told Hotch.

"Thanks Dave, I appreciate it. I'm sure there will be facets of Jane's care that will require a woman's help. If you need me for anything at the BAU, just give me a call." Hotch told him.

"Not a chance!" Dave said forcefully as Hotch just stared at him. "You heard Strauss, you're not to call even to check your voicemail for another week and, god help me, I agree with her! I don't want you even _thinking_ about the BAU for the next week.

Hotch wasn't worried about this, he knew he could sweet talk someone on the team into bringing him files. He was mentally listing the bribes he would need when Dave broke into his thoughts.

"Don't even think about having one our team members bring you files, Hotch." Dave said, as if reading his mind. "My first decree on Monday will be a general threat against that action. Believe me when I tell you that none of our team will want to cross me after the threats I lay down."

"Dammit Dave!" Hotch said, irritated, "I am going to go nuts with nothing to do for the next week."

"You're not going to have 'nothing to do' during that time, you are going to be taking care of your daughter! She's going to need you there entirely." Dave couldn't believe Hotch was fighting him on this.

"I suppose you're right." Hotch conceded.

"I am," Dave said firmly. "Now how about we fire up the grill for some BBQ during the game?"

**********

While Hotch slept like a baby, Penelope and Derek had a rough night with Jane. The pain shot put her to sleep at around ten o'clock but at eleven-thirty, just as they were settling into the chairs next to Jane's bed, Pen and Derek were surprised by a loud scream from her.

"No, get off of me! No! No! NO!" She yelled.

Derek did the first thing that sprung to his mind; he went to Jane and tried to wake her up.

"Jane, wake up!" He said forcefully, shaking her shoulder.

"I said NO! You can't do this to me!" She screamed, swinging wildly. One of her fists connected with Derek's face and he went down.

"Shit, that hurt! You got her Babygirl?" He yelled to Penelope.

"I will, just give me a second!" Pen said, coming to Jane's side. "Jane sweetie, wake up, you're safe." Pen said, giving her a bear hug in order to hold her arms down and comfort her.

"No, please no! I'll do anything…please no!" Jane said, crying now. Penelope sat on her bed holding her.

"It's alright sweetie, please wake up! It's OK, you're safe!" Pen said, still holding Jane's arms against her side and rocking her. Jane slowly came out of her dream and realized that she wasn't in that horrible basement anymore, she was safe.

"Penelope?" She asked shakily.

"It's me, sweets, you're OK." Penelope told her, still holding her and rocking her.

"I-I dreamt…I dreamt that I was back in that basement…"Jane stammered. The dream had seemed so real, she still wasn't sure whether or not she was still sleeping. "Th-Then when you all came in and he started killing all of you."

"Shhhh, it's OK sweetie, you're safe." Penelope told her, still holding her. Derek poured Jane a glass of water and handed it to her. When she finished drinking it she looked up at him. "Holy shit, did I do that?" Derek's left eye was swelling and turning black and blue.

"Yeah, damn girl you have a great left hook! Who taught you how to fight like that?" He asked her.

"Only one of the best agents in the FBI," she said with a quivering smile. "Seriously Derek, I am _so _sorry-"

"What are you apologizing for, having a nightmare? I should have known better than to approach you head on. Don't worry about this Jane, it will heal." Derek told her.

"Besides, the man looks sexy with some war wounds!" Penelope told her as she let go of Jane and eased off of her bed. "Why don't you try and go back to sleep, sweets?"

Jane laid back in her bed, "Ok, I'll try," she said, dubiously. Within five minutes, she had fallen back asleep. Derek and Penelope, both hoping the worst was over for the night, settled back in their chairs and also fell asleep.

They slept until about one o'clock, when Jane woke up screaming again. This time it took Penelope almost five full minutes to convince her she was safe. Jane fell back asleep by one-thirty but was up again at three o'clock with yet another nightmare. After that, she refused to go back to sleep. She kept her TV on low while Pen and Derek slept, and spent another night watching infomercials.

Derek and Pen woke up at about six o'clock the next morning and they all ate breakfast together in Jane's room. At around eight, Derek headed back home leaving Jane and Penelope in the room together.

"Jane, why don't you let me get that psychologist back in here? Maybe she can help with your nightmares." Pen asked her.

"No thanks, Pen." Jane said, resolutely.

"You need to talk to someone about this sweetie; it's not going to get better on its own."

"Let it go Pen," Jane said, with a warning in her voice, "You were able to bully me into taking the pain shot the last two nights, but you're not going to win with this."

"Fine," Penelope sighed. For the next three hours, they watched TV in silence, both of them dozing every once in awhile. That silence was broken when Jane's friend Mel burst through the door.

"Jane!"

"Mel!"

Both girls hugged and then Mel stood back and looked at Jane. "Christ, you _still _look like shit! Aren't you supposed to get better in a hospital? You look like you haven't slept in days."

"Yeah, well…I've been having nightmares." Jane told her.

"Well then shouldn't you be talking to a shrink? Maybe that would help." Mel said, not knowing what she was stepping into.

"_THANK_ YOU!" Penelope all but yelled, "Her father and I have been telling her the same thing for days!"

"God Jane, what the hell is wrong with you? Talk to the damned shrink." Mel told her.

"Let it go, both of you. I am in no mood to deal with this right now." Jane said, her voice quiet but lethal.

They let it go only because Erin Strauss walked into the room.

"Erin! God I haven't seen you in days." Jane said, relieved to have something to change the subject from psychologists and therapy.

Erin gave Jane a gentle hug. "Sorry about that, I've been working all week. How are you doing? You look like you haven't been sleeping much."

Jane groaned, "Please don't get them started again." She begged as JJ and Emily came into the room holding bags of food.

"Wow, it looks like everyone is here today. What's going on?" Jane asked.

"Well sweetie, we figured that you could do with a testosterone free afternoon, so we banished the men and declared this to be a 'girls only' afternoon." Garcia told her.

"Really?" Jane asked, grinning.

"Really." Emily said, firmly. "We have chick flicks and junk food and Cosmo magazine. What else more could you want?"

"We also brought burgers and fries from Five Guys; we know they're your favorite." JJ added.

"And I was able to burn some of your DVR'd TV shows to DVD. Don't ask me how I did it since it is outside of the realm of legal, but we have all of the girly shows: 90210, Gossip Girl, Melrose Place, Glee and America's Next Top Model." Garcia told her.

"We can't watch Glee or ANTM; my dad would kill me if I watched those without him." As soon as she said the words, she gasped and clamped a hand over her mouth. That was one of her best kept secrets, her dad was going to KILL her!

Everyone in the room froze as they realized what Jane had said. "Are you telling us that your dad watches ANTM? Glee?" Emily said, a grin breaking out onto her face.

"Yes, but-" With that, the room burst into amazed and amused pandemonium.

"OH MY GOD! This is TOO good!" Garcia said.

"Hotch…ANTM…" JJ said, doubled over in laughter, Mel joining in.

Erin just sat in amazement, trying to picture one of her most straight-laced agents watching those TV shows.

"I _so_ know what I'm getting Hotch for Christmas this year, the first cycle of ANTM on DVD and I'm going to give it to him at the BAU Christmas party!" Emily chortled.

"NO! Nobody can say _anything_ to him! These goddamn painkillers, they've eaten away at the filter that goes from my brain to my mouth!" Jane said in frustration. "Look, my dad's love of mindless TV is one of his and my best kept secrets. It's one of his only outlets of relaxation, do you really want to take that away from him? _Please _don't let on that you know. _Please_!" Jane begged them all.

"OK, Jane. It's going to be hard, but we'll keep your secret." Emily promised.

The women spent the rest of the afternoon watching TV, gossiping, and eating junk food. It was one of the most relaxed days Jane had at the hospital.

Hotch and Dave arrived at Jane's room at around seven-fifteen. Erin had left earlier and JJ, Emily, Erin and Mel were all saying goodbye to Jane when they entered. As she, Emily and JJ left, Mel turned to Hotch. "So, do you think you and Jane will watch TV tonight?" She asked him.

"Yeah, I suppose we will." Hotch answered.

"Well, have fun." Mel said. She, JJ and Emily left the room after that and as soon as they got through the door, their laughter could be heard from the hallway.

"What was that all about?" Hotch asked, confused.

"Dunno, too much sugar maybe?" Jane said and then changed the subject. "Did you sleep well last night?" Jane wanted to see if her dad was pissed at the subterfuge.

He came over and kissed her forehead, "I did, thank you. How about you?"

"I slept fine." She lied, shooting a look at Penelope that said 'shut up.'

Hotch sighed, "I don't know why, after seventeen years of living with me, you think you can get away with lying to me."

"Damn profilers." Jane mumbled.

"It doesn't take a profiler to see that you are not sleeping well, you look terrible." Hotch told her, about to bring up the topic of talking to a psychologist once again, but fortunately for Jane she was saved by Dr. Adams' entrance.

"Hello everyone." She said.

"Hello Dr. Adams. Dave and I just got here and we brought pizza for dinner. Would you care to join us while you update us about Jane's status?" Hotch asked her.

Dr. Adams smiled, "I would love to, I didn't have time to eat lunch today. Maybe we would be more comfortable in the conference room down the hall?"

"That's fine, I'll get a wheelchair for Jane." Hotch said.

"Actually Aaron, I would prefer it if Jane walked. I want her to start walking so hopefully the dizziness she feels when standing will start to subside." Dr. Adams told him.

"Hotch, why don't you and Dave start setting up in the conference room. I'll help Jane into her robe and we'll be down in just a minute." Garcia told him.

'Just a minute' actually took almost ten minutes. First they had to get Jane's robe on her without tangling her IV lines and then it took Jane awhile to make it down the hallway. It was a real embarrassment for her that she was out of breath by the time she reached the conference room. She was on the track team for crying out loud!

Once they were all settled into the conference room, Dr. Adams started the meeting.

"I can say without a doubt that I am impressed with the way Jane is healing. Her kidney function is back to normal and she hasn't had any breathing complications from her decreased ability to take a deep breath." Dr. Adams realized she was talking about Jane like she wasn't in the room and she switched her focus to the girl. "The welts, bruises and cuts on your back are healing rather nicely, as is your branding. The bullet wound in your arm is also healing faster than I expected." Dr. Adams paused to take a bite of pizza and then continued.

"Neurology believes that you are recovering from your concussion about as well as can be expected, but they asked me to warn you that you may have some long-term effects from it."

"Like what?" Jane asked, nervously.

"Intermittent dizziness, sporadic double vision and migraine headaches are the three most common long-term effects from a concussion like yours. You may never experience these effects, but I want you to be prepared if you do. I want you to call me or your primary physician if you experience any of these, which brings me to my next point. It is Saturday night right now, I think we can set Monday as your day of release from here." Dr. Adams told Jane.

"Really?" Jane asked with a smile.

"Dr. Adams, don't you think it is too soon for Jane to be released?" Hotch asked. It's not that he didn't want his daughter at home, it's just that Jane still seemed to be quite a mess and he felt she would receive better care in the hospital.

"Not at all, Aaron. Jane's latest blood work showed a marked decrease of the infection in her blood stream, enough of a decrease that I can switch her over to oral antibiotics on Monday. The rest of her tests look good as well. The only reasons I am not discharging her tomorrow is because I want one more day of observation for her concussion and I want one more debridement for her branding." Dr. Adams looked at the occupants of the room, "Do any of you have questions for me?"

Jane spoke up, "How long until I can have my nose and branding fixed?"

"As long as there are no setbacks, I would say you could have the repairs done during the second week of October. That gives you two weeks to build up your strength."

"What are her restrictions once she's home?" Penelope asked.

"She should take it easy for the first two weeks." Seeing Jane's face fall, Dr. Adams spoke directly to her, "I'm not saying you should stay in bed Jane, but use common sense. You can work on school work, walk around the house and work on your computer. You can take small shopping trips to the grocery store and such, although with the dizziness you are still experiencing, I would recommend you don't go alone. It's also because of the dizziness and weakness that I don't want you driving for at least a month."

"A month!" Dr. Adams nodded. "When can I return to school?"

"The target date for that hasn't changed, I would guess that you will be healed enough to return to school by the last week in October." Dr. Adams told her. "The main thing is that you need to rest and sleep as much as possible over the next two weeks."

"About that," Hotch spoke up, "Jane hasn't been sleeping well since she woke up from her sedation, she's been having nightmares. Can you give her something to help her sleep?"

Jane glared at her dad, she had hoped the topic wouldn't come up. Hotch saw the glare Jane was giving him and just stared back at her.

"The best thing would be for Jane to start talking to a psychologist. That would slowly help with the nightmares." Dr. Adams said.

"Not happening. Next?" Jane said, stubbornly.

"Jane," Hotch began, with a warning in his voice. "You need to sleep, if this would help you-"

"No, I'm NOT doing it!" Jane said loudly. Hotch sighed, he didn't know exactly what her hang up about therapy was, but it was starting to get old.

"Well in that case, I can give Jane a shot tonight that will help her sleep and then I can send her home with a prescription for sleeping pills-"

"NO! Don't you people get it? I. Don't. Want. To. Sleep. The nightmares come when I sleep! Why would I voluntarily go to the place where the nightmares are?!"

"Honey, you need sleep. Just let the doc give you the shot so you can get some rest." Dave said.

"NO! No shots!" Jane knew she was starting to sound like a three year old, but she didn't care.

"That's it!" Hotch said, finally coming to the end of his patience. "You ARE getting that shot tonight Jane, end of discussion. I don't care if the three of us have to hold you down, you need a good night sleep." Seeing that Jane was about to interrupt him, Hotch kept speaking. "Do the math, you're under eighteen which means I make the medical decisions for you, and I'm deciding that you are going to sleep tonight, just like you decided that I was going to get a good night's sleep last night."

Jane looked at Dr. Adams in desperation. "Normally I wouldn't go against a patient's wishes even if they are under eighteen, but seeing as all three of the people with the authority to make medical decisions for you want you to have the shot, and I happen to agree with them, I am going to override your wishes and give you the shot." Dr. Adams told her.

Jane looked around the room at the concerned faces and admitted defeat. "Fine, I'll take the shot."

"Good, that will certainly make it easier. Now are there any other questions?" Dr. Adams asked. No one had any so they broke up the meeting. Pen walked back to the room with Jane while the guys cleaned up their mess in the conference room. Jane had barely laid down before the nurse came in with the shot to help her sleep. She shot the medicine directly into her IV and Jane was asleep before the nurse left the room.

**********

_This chapter is a monster! I only wanted a short, 1000 word chapter but I couldn't stop writing. I considered breaking it up, but with my papers and everything, I don't know when I'll be able to post again, so I decided to keep it as one large chapter._

_Some of you may have recognized the plastic surgeons…later on in the story, I'm going to have a mini-crossover with the show 'Nip Tuck.' You don't have to watch Nip/Tuck to be able to follow along_.


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 16

* * *

Sunday was an uneventful day at the hospital. Jane practiced walking, got her final debridement for her branding, received her final round of IV antibiotics and was evaluated one last time by the neurology department. On Sunday night, Dr. Adams came to her room and proclaimed her ready to go home the next day. She left all of her contact information with Jane and Aaron and told them to call her if they had any questions.

Hotch followed Dr. Adams out of Jane's room. "Do you have a second, Dr. Adams?"

She smiled, "I'll bet I know what this is about."

"She's still not sleeping well, even with the sedation last night she tossed and turned and I could tell by her facial expressions that she was having nightmares. Why do you think she's fighting so hard against therapy?" He asked her.

"I'm not a psychologist Aaron, but it's easy enough to see that Jane is someone who needs to be in control. My guess is she's afraid that a psychologist will break through her shields and force her to relinquish her control, and she's right." Dr. Adams told her.

"Still, she needs therapy. Do you think I should force her?" He asked, fully prepared to drag Jane to therapy if Dr. Adams deemed it necessary.

"I would wait for a little while. It's been my experience that people like Jane eventually lose their grip on their tightly held control and once that happens, she will be more receptive to therapy. If you drag her there now, it might do more damage than good."

Hotch blew out a breath, frustrated, "But what if it takes too long for her to lose it? She needs to build up her strength and I know she cannot do that if she is not sleeping."

"I've been watching Jane and I think she is close to her breaking point. My guess is that once she is back home in a safe and familiar environment, she'll crack. You will need to be there for her when that happens as it will be a considerable emotional storm. Once she hits her breaking point, you will want to get her into therapy quickly." Dr. Adams fished in her lab coat pocket for a card. "This is the name of an excellent psychologist; she specializes in the treatment of traumatized teenage girls. I let her know about Jane and she says she will make time for an appointment, no matter when you call."

Hotch took the card, "I don't know how to thank you for all that you've done for Jane, Dr. Adams."

"It was easy Aaron; you have a brave girl in there. I am confident she will make it through this, especially with you by her side." Dr. Adams reassured him before rushing off to answer an emergency page.

**********

The next morning, Jane was excited to be going home. She was a little lonely, since Penelope had to report back to work with the rest of the team and couldn't be at the hospital, but she got over her loneliness once the nurse came into her room to help her get dressed.

Hotch stepped out of the room while Jane was getting dressed. He signed her discharge paperwork, picked up her medications and thanked the staff for their assistance during the past week. He walked back into Jane's room and saw that she was dressed in sweatpants and a sweatshirt. The bruising in her face had gone down considerably and, other than her nose, her face looked somewhat normal. Hotch smiled at her, "Are you ready to blow this joint?"

"More than ready, let's roll!" Jane said, getting off of her bed. Hotch, picked up her bags and took her arm.

"You need to wait for the nurse, sweetie." He told her, noticing that she still tensed up at that particular term of endearment.

Jane sat back down on the edge of the bed, "Argh! So close!"

Just as she got the words out, the nurse came in with a wheelchair. "In you go, Jane," she said.

Jane just stared at the wheelchair, "No thanks, I'll walk."

"Sorry, it's hospital policy." The nurse told her.

Hotch could see that Jane was gearing up for a battle, "Just get in the chair Jane. The sooner you do, the sooner you can get out of here."

Jane got into the wheelchair, glaring at the nurse the entire time. When they finally got to the front doors of the hospital Jane was relieved to see her dad's SUV parked there. The nurse stopped the wheelchair and Hotch helped her up and into the car. He could tell she was dizzy, so he took it slow with her. Once she was in her seat, Hotch helped her with her seatbelt and then got in on the driver's side.

The drive home was slow; Hotch didn't want to jar any of Jane's injuries by going too fast and he also didn't want to increase her dizziness. It felt weird to Jane to be riding in her dad's car after everything that had happened, it was surreally normal. She finally noticed that her dad had on some classic rock crap and reached for the stereo controls. As she did so, she stopped suddenly, grabbed her ribs and hissed. Hotch looked over, concerned. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, I just forgot that I can't reach that far or that suddenly," she said, still grabbing at her ribs.

"In time you'll be back to your radio ADD habits, it's just going to take awhile for you to heal," he told her.

"Yeah, I know," she said quietly as she watched the familiar landscape go by.

Twenty minutes later they pulled up to their house. Jane just stared at it for a minute; it felt like she had been away for years. Hotch parked on the street in front of the house as he figured it would not be smart on his part to park on the driveway and have Jane go in through the back door. He helped her out of the car and they made their way to the front door, Hotch keeping a firm hold on her the entire time.

They were about halfway to the door when they heard a voice call out. "Aaron, Jane, it's so good to see you!" Mary Ventner said as she walked up to them. She gave Jane a gentle hug, "How are you Jane?" She asked. Mary Ventner had known Jane since she was five years old.

Jane gave her a small smile, "I'm doing alright, Mary."

Mary looked at her skeptically, "Mmmm hmmm," she said, not believing her, "I have to go to work, but if either of you need anything, give me a call," she said, kissing Jane's cheek.

After she left, Jane and Hotch made it to the front door. Hotch opened and let Jane go in first. He almost ran into her as she stopped just inside the doorway and he watched as she breathed in and looked around. Almost as if she was in a trance, she entered the house and began slowly wandering around, almost as if she was reacquainting herself with her home. He continued watching her as a tear ran down her cheek. Wondering if this was the start of the emotional break that Dr. Adams warned him about, Hotch came up next to her.

"Are you alright Jane?" He asked quietly.

"I never thought I would be back here." Jane answered, almost in a whisper. "I never thought I would make it out of that basement alive."

"But you _did_ make it out alive. You're back home, safe and sound." Hotch told her.

Jane stood still for a moment, trying to get her emotions under control. After another minute, she wiped the tears from her face and looked at her father. "What's on the agenda for today?" She asked him with a brightness that she didn't feel.

"The only thing on the agenda is for you to rest. Why don't you settle on the couch while I make us some breakfast?"

"That sounds great, dad." Jane said, laying down on the sofa. Her dad grabbed a blanket from the nearby chair and covered her with it.

**

After breakfast, Jane and Hotch lounged around the living room, watching morning game shows. As they were watching the closing credits of _The Price Is Right_, Jane got up off of the couch.

"Whatever you need Jane, I can get it for you." Hotch said, sitting up.

"Actually, I am going upstairs to shower." Jane told him, heading for the stairs. Hotch jumped up from the easy chair he had been sprawled out in and blocked her way.

"I don't think that's a good idea you're still too dizzy to walk up the stairs and I'm afraid that the heat of the shower might make you even dizzier." He said.

Jane just looked at him. "I _am_ going upstairs to take a shower, dad. I haven't showered since this whole thing began and I feel gross. I know I had sponge baths in the hospital, but it wasn't the same thing as having running water on me. I feel disgusting and dirty and I smell like the hospital. Please move so I can go up the stairs."

Hotch saw the determination in her eyes, thought for a second and then stepped aside. Jane nodded her thanks and then started up the stairs. Her first step was shaky and on the second step she had to grip the railing tightly to keep from falling.

"Oh, for the love of god." Hotch mumbled and came up behind her. He put one arm around her waist, scooped her up and carried her up the stairs.

"This is crazy, put me down dad! I'm too heavy; you're going to throw your back out!" Jane told him, embarrassed by the fact that she couldn't make it up the stairs on her own.

"If you insist on coming up here, then I'm going to help you. Right now you weigh about a hundred pounds soaking wet. The day I can't lift a hundred pounds without hurting myself is the day you can roll me into my grave." Hotch said as they came to the top of the stairs. He set her down and she made her way to her bedroom.

Once Jane got to her bedroom door, she paused again and looked around. She had expected her room to look different, but thankfully it seemed the same and the sameness comforted her. She opened her dresser drawer and pulled out a nightgown to change into after shower; even though it was still morning the waistband from her sweatpants was irritating her branding and it wasn't like she was going anywhere. She turned to go down the hall to her bathroom when her dad appeared in the doorway to her room.

"OK, here's how it's going to work," he said, handing her a towel. "You can take your shower, but the bathroom door stays open-"

"Daaaadddd!" Jane protested.

"I'm not saying it has to be wide open, but I want to be able to hear you if you need help." Seeing that she was about to interrupt, Hotch kept talking. "This is non-negotiable Jane. If you would like to wait until tonight to shower, when Penelope can help you, that is an option but if you want to shower now, the door stays open. You can take as long as you want in the shower, I will be in my room reading so I will be able to hear you if you need help." Her dad's room was across the hall and just down from her bathroom.

Jane pondered his terms for a minute. "Ok, the door stays open, but you stay in your room unless you hear me call for help or you think something is wrong."

Jane took her towel and nightgown and headed for the bathroom while Hotch went into his bedroom and began to read. About five minutes later he heard Jane swear and then he heard soft crying. He got up off his bed, went to the bathroom door that was half open and knocked. "Jane, are you alright?" He asked, looking at the ceiling just in case she was half-dressed.

"Yes…no…you can come in dad, I'm still dressed." Hotch pushed the door all the way open and stepped into the bathroom. Jane was red faced and she looked frustrated.

"What's the problem sweetie?" Hotch asked, concerned she may have hurt herself.

"I can't get this stupid sweatshirt off because I can't raise my arms up that high. I never thought my broken and bruised ribs and my hurt back would affect my movement this much!" Jane said, pissed off.

"Do want help getting it off?" Hotch asked her.

"No!" She said emphatically. She was sure she would just die if she had to have her dad help her off with her top. It was bad enough in the hospital with all of the doctors and nurses seeing her like that, but having her dad help her undress? She was sure she would die of embarrassment! On the other hand, she _really_ wanted to shower. God! She felt so weak and helpless.

Hotch watched as Jane started crying. This was not the emotional break that Dr. Adams warned him about, this was sheer frustration. He knew how much his daughter wanted to shower, he had felt the same way after he was shot. He tried to think of a way to help Jane that wouldn't embarrass her.

"Jane, are you wearing…underthings under your sweatshirt and sweat pants?" Hotch asked her.

Even though she was pissed off and frustrated, Jane was somewhat amused by her father. In the seventeen years she had known him, she had rarely heard him say 'bra' or 'panties' it was always 'underthings' or 'stuff on underneath.' It was funny to her because she knew that in his job he had to talk about horrible acts, but he couldn't use those simple words in conversation with her.

"Yeah, the nurse helped me put on my…underthings," she told him.

"Well, I can't imagine that your…bra and panties…will show more than your bikini does." Hotch told her, praying he was right. He wasn't really sure if he wanted to know whether or not his daughter wore revealing lingerie.

"No, they probably won't..." Jane said, thoughtfully.

"Well you paraded around here in that thing all summer, so why should you be embarrassed about this?" Hotch asked her.

Jane thought for a minute, her dad had a point, her bikini was much more revealing and he had seen her in that about a hundred times. Besides, she _really _ wanted to take a shower. She took a deep breath, "OK…will you help me get my sweatshirt off?"

"Sure thing." He closed the toilet lid, had her sit down and he slowly pulled the sweatshirt over her head. "Are you going to be OK with everything else?"

"Yeah, I should be fine." Jane said, wishing the floor would just swallow her up.

"OK, I'll be in my room reading, yell if you need anything." Hotch left, closing the bathroom door most of the way.

Jane stood up and slowly undressed the rest of the way, thank god for front hook bras! After she undressed she looked at her body in the full length mirror, it was the first time she had seen all of her wounds and she was almost sickened by them. Her back was a mess of welts, stripes and cuts and her stomach and torso were still black and blue. Where the bullet grazed her arm was still an angry red and just looking at her nose made her want to vomit. She looked at herself for a few minutes and shed a couple of tears before she finally turned the shower on.

As soon as she stepped in she felt much better. It felt so nice to have hot water running over her body. It helped her feel clean again and it relieved some of the aches and pains she was feeling. It was hard to shampoo her hair, but she managed and she stayed in the shower until there was barely a drop of hot water left. After about thirty minutes, she turned off the shower, wrapped herself in her big fluffy towel and stepped out. She knew she would need help drying and brushing her hair, so she decided to get dressed right away. She almost died again when she realized she would need help getting into her nightgown. She wrapped the towel around her like a dress and tucked it in so it was able to stay on her without her holding it.

"Dad!" She yelled. Within seconds he was outside the partially open door.

"What do you need?" He asked.

"Can you come in here for a second?" Hotch entered the bathroom and found Jane sitting on the closed toilet wrapped in a towel and clutching her night gown.

"I need help…" She said, obviously embarrassed.

"OK." Hotch said as he took her nightgown and slid it over her head. Once that was done, Jane slowly put her arms in the sleeves and then pulled the nightgown down so it covered her knees. She then stood up and the towel slid to the floor. 'That was easier than I thought it would be,' she thought, 'Less humiliating too.'

Hotch picked up the towel, "Need help with your hair?"

"Yes please." Hotch started gently drying her hair. Once that was done, he brushed it and helped her up.

"Well, that wasn't _too_ terrible, was it?" He asked.

"No, it could have been a lot worse." Jane agreed.

"Where to now? Back to the couch or would you like to relax in your room?" Hotch asked.

"That depends, are you going to insist on carrying me down the stairs?" She asked him.

"Yup."

"Well then I guess I'll stay in my room." She decided.

"OK, you go relax and I'll bring your lunch up to you in a few minutes." Hotch went down the stairs while Jane started towards her room. She laid down on her bed and dozed until her dad brought her favorite lunch; grilled cheese and french fries. The sandwich was a little burnt and the fries were a little raw, but it was nice to be eating normal food in a normal setting. Hotch also ate his lunch with her and after they were finished he pulled her pill bottles out of his pocket. He counted out the pills and handed them to her.

"God, I'm going to start rattling soon if I take this many pills. What are they?" She asked.

"These are your antibiotics," Hotch said, pointing to two large pills, "These are anti-inflamitories to help with your injured muscles and these are your pain pills."

"Dad, I don't want-"

"Don't even try arguing with me about this Jane. I know you're in pain, all of the movement today has to be hurting you. You are going to take the pain pills if I have to hold your nose to make you open your mouth." Hotch said, firmly.

Jane knew better than to argue with him when he was like this. She obediently took all of her pills and washed them down with some water.

"Good, now do you want to take a nap up here, or would you rather be on the couch downstairs."

Jane thought for a minute, "The couch, but I can make it down the stairs by myself dad." Hotch just looked at her. "Or maybe I can't…" She said after seeing the look on her dad's face.

"Humor me today, OK? I just got you home from the hospital, I don't want you hurting yourself." He said.

"OK dad." Jane got up from her bed and walked down the hall. When she got to the staircase her dad once again scooped her up and carried her down the stairs. He set her on the couch and covered her with the blanket and then made himself comfy on the easy chair next to the couch. He watched as Jane relaxed and slowly fell asleep.

An hour later, his attention was ripped from the book he was holding by a loud scream coming from Jane.

She sat bolt upright on the couch and started swinging her arms. She was yelling but the words were not coherent. Hotch jumped up from the chair and knelt down next to her. It took him a few minutes but he finally got her calmed down. After that she refused to go back to sleep.

At around five o'clock, Jane was still watching TV and dozing on the couch and Hotch got up to defrost one of the dinners Sean left them. His culinary skills were interrupted by the doorbell. He answered the door and went into the living room.

"You have a couple of visitors, Jane."

**********


	17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 16

* * *

Jane looked up as Mel and Andy walked into the living room. Andy! She hadn't seen her boyfriend of over a year since before she was taken and she hadn't realized how much she missed him. She made a mental note to kill Mel for not warning her they were coming, if she had known she would have made an effort to look more presentable. She looked down at what she was wearing and gave a mental groan; she was wearing one of her comfiest nightgowns, but it was also one of her rattiest. She wasn't wearing a speck of makeup and she knew her hair had definitely seen better days.

"I'll be in the kitchen if you need anything." Hotch said, leaving the room. He hoped her meeting with Andy went well, he knew it bothered her that he never came to visit her in the hospital.

After Hotch left, Mel walked to where Jane was sitting on the couch and gave her a hug. "You're looking better than when I saw you last," she said.

"Well since you last saw me in the hospital, I would hope I look better." Jane told her. Her gaze wandered past Mel to Andy; he looked uncomfortable. "Hi Andy," she said.

"Hi Jane," he replied, coming over to the sofa. He stopped in front of her, as if not sure of what to do. He seemed to think for a minute and then awkwardly patted her on the shoulder.

'Wow, what a horrible greeting,' Jane thought. She hadn't expected one of their passionate kisses, but she expected more than a pat on the shoulder. "Why don't you guys have a seat?" She said, gesturing towards the end of the couch and the chair next to it.

Mel let Andy choose his seat first and, almost unsurprisingly, he chose the chair. Mel plopped down on the couch and turned to Jane, "So how is it being back home?"

"Weird, definitely weird," she said.

Mel proceeded to fill Jane in on all of the gossip she missed at school. The whole time Mel was talking, Andy was looking uncomfortably around the room, as if he would have rather been anywhere else. He kept fidgeting and looking towards the door and he barely said two words to Jane the entire time he was there. Finally, after about half an hour, Andy spoke up.

"Well I'm glad you're doing well, Jane. I have to get going; I have to get home for dinner."

"OK Andy, thanks for coming by." Jane said softly, struggling to get up from the couch.

"Stay there Jane, I'll walk him to the door," Mel said as she got up. Jane heard them walk to the door and then heard the door open and shut. She closed her eyes, trying to get her emotions under control. She opened them when she heard Mel's voice.

"Well that could have gone better," she said.

"You think?" Jane said, angrily.

Mel opened her mouth to say something, but at that moment Hotch came back into the room. "Did I hear the door?"

"Yeah, Andy just left." Jane said, still glaring at Mel.

"Oh," Hotch said. 'That was a quick visit,' he thought. "Well Dave and Penelope are stuck at the BAU getting caught up on things, so they can't make it tonight. Do you want to stay for dinner Mel? " He asked.

"Um…that depends…who's cooking?" Mel had been around the Hotchner household enough to know about Aaron's cooking skills.

Hotch smiled, "My brother Sean came to town for a few days and stocked our freezer with meals. All I am doing is microwaving them."

"Then sure I'll stay for dinner." Mel said, brightly. "Thanks Aar-"

"God Mel! You couldn't have called to warn me that Andy was coming?! I look like shit! At the very least I could have made myself presentable!" Jane shouted.

"I'm sorry Jane! He decided at the last minute to come, we were literally on the Metro when he said he was going to come here. What was I supposed to do? There is no signal in the Metro tunnels!"

"Jesus! So instead you bring him here when I am fresh out of the hospital?! Do you _know _what a horrible idea that was? He couldn't get out of here fast enough and it's all your fault!" Jane yelled.

Mel's eyes filled up with tears, "Um, I think I'll eat supper at my house Aaron, thanks for the offer though," she said softly, making her way towards the door. "I'll talk to you later Jane." With that, she let herself out the front door.

Jane sat back on the couch and gave an angry sigh. Hotch just stared at her for a minute. "Dinner's ready."

"I'm not real hungry right now, dad," she said, not looking at him.

"I didn't ask if you were hungry, I'm telling you that dinner is ready," he said, firmly. That got Jane's attention and she looked at him. "You need to build up your strength and you can't do that if you don't eat, so wash up and meet me at the dinner table."

Jane followed her dad's orders and was sitting at the dinner table less than five minutes later. Hotch started filling her plate with food.

"Sean really made some good food; this is fettuccini alfredo with sautéed chicken. If it tastes half as good as it smells, we are in for a good meal." Hotch said, trying to lift the mood. He set a plate full of food down in front of Jane and then he sat down with his own plate. They both started eating in silence.

After about five minutes, Hotch broke the silence. "Do you want to talk about Andy's visit, sweetie?"

"No."

Hotch sighed, "Mel didn't deserve what you said to-"

"Leave it alone dad, I am NOT in the mood to hear about it right now." Jane said, testily.

Hotch was at a loss for what to do. Under normal circumstances he would not allow her to talk to him like that, but these were not normal circumstances so he stayed quiet.

Jane, having picked at her food, pushed her chair back from the table, "I can't eat anymore, I'm going to go back into the living room," she said, getting up from her chair. That snapped Hotch out of his indecision.

"Sit down Jane," he said. Jane glared at him for a moment and then sat back down. "You may be recuperating, but we still have house rules and one of those rules is that neither one of us leaves the table until both of us are done eating. I'm not done eating yet and you most certainly are not finished eating yet."

"I AM finished eating, I told you I'm not hungry," she said, pissily.

"I'm not going to do this with you Jane; you are going to finish everything on your plate." Seeing that she was about to interrupt him, he kept talking, "Not only do you have to build up your strength, you also need to re-gain some of the weight you lost while you were in captivity. Not to mention that you need to take your pain pills with food."

"But I'm not-"

"For the sake of both of our sanity's, do NOT finish that sentence." Hotch said, "You ARE taking your pain pills tonight, end of discussion. Now eat."

Jane picked up her fork and started eating, giving him the evil eye the entire time. Once her plate was clean, she set her fork down and asked snidely, "Are you happy now?"

"Ecstatic." Hotch said, flatly.

Jane made her way back to the couch while Hotch cleaned up the kitchen. After he was done, he joined her in the living room and watched TV with her. They both fell asleep there, but Jane was once again plagued with nightmares all night. She finally gave up on sleep at around two o'clock and watched the TV on low as her dad slept.

Hotch woke up the next morning at around six o'clock. For a moment he was disoriented as he looked around the living room. After a minute, he remembered that he and Jane had been watching TV well into the night and he deduced that he must have slept there all night. He remembered waking up a couple of times when Jane had nightmares, but otherwise he had slept fairly deeply.

He sat up to see how Jane was doing and felt his heart stop when he saw she wasn't on the couch. 'Maybe she's in the bathroom,' he told himself as he frantically started looking around for her. He looked in all of the rooms on the first floor for her and didn't find her. He knew she had to be around because there was fresh coffee in the kitchen, but that didn't stop the feeling of panic from rising as he ran up to the second floor. He looked in every room, but there was no sign of her. Running back down the stairs, he was about to grab his cell phone to call Dave and Penelope when he looked out the living room window; on the porch sat his daughter. She was bundled up in her sweater, sitting on the porch swing and drinking coffee. They hardly ever used the porch as a place to sit as both of them preferred the patio in the back yard, but to get to there, she would have had to go out the back door and that was obviously not going to happen.

Hotch didn't know whether to hug her or scream at her. Part of him realized that she needed to get out of the house, to reflect on all that had happened to her, but the other part was still panicked at finding her missing so soon after he woke up. He went back into the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee. Walking towards the door with it, he took a deep breath and decided that unless she gave him cause to be angry, he was going to go with understanding.

"Mind if I join you?" He asked as he stepped out of the front door.

"Sure," she said, softly.

Hotch sat down on the swing and shivered. It might have been late September, but there was definitely a chill in the morning air. Jane noticed the shiver and offered him part of the blanket she had brought out with her. He accepted it and spread it out over both of their legs.

"Doing better this morning?" He asked her.

"Not really…" She said, trailing off.

They both sat in silence for a few minutes.

"I just wish I could turn my brain off, you know?" Jane said softly, breaking the silence.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Hotch asked, hoping that she would…if not with him, then with _somebody._

"No, not really." Jane said with a sigh. "It's just a bunch of stuff in my head. I can't stop thinking about the past, present and future."

"You know I'm always here if you want to talk." Hotch told her.

"Yeah, I know…thanks."

They sat for another few minutes, watching the sunrise.

"I want to go to school on Thursday." Jane told him, decisively.

"Jane, you heard Dr. Adams-"

"I don't want to go to class or anything; I just want to meet with my teachers after school. I want to get something set up so I can keep up with my classes, I _don't _want to fall any further behind. As it is, my GPA is going to be royally screwed up from this," she said.

Hotch thought for a minute, "I'll call the school later today and set something up."

"Thanks dad."

"Could you do me a favor, sweetie? Could you not disappear outside in the early morning hours so soon after you survived a horrific kidnapping? You know, unless you _want_ me to have a heart attack or something." Hotch was only half joking about the heart attack, when he couldn't find her, it had felt like his heart was going to pound out of his chest.

Jane gave a small smile, "Sure thing, dad," she thought for a minute and her smile faded, "Is this how it's going to be from now on? I can't leave your sight without letting you know where I'm going?" Jane said this without anger; she honestly wanted to know if this was going to be the new norm for them.

Hotch was taken aback by the lack of emotion in Jane's voice, "I don't know sweetie, I know this is how it's going to be for a little while…after that, I'm not sure."

She sighed, "I would kinda like to be alone for awhile dad."

Hotch got up, "No problem, I'll go make breakfast." With that he went into the house and left his daughter to ponder her life.


	18. Chapter 18

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 18

* * *

Tuesday was similar to Monday for Jane and Aaron. They ate breakfast while watching TV, they went through the shower routine without a hitch and then they both spent the rest of the day dozing in the living room. Jane was much quieter than she had been the day before and that worried Hotch, he almost preferred the anger from her the night before. He would catch her staring off into space for minutes at a time and when he asked her what she was thinking about, the answer was always "nothing."

At around five-thirty that evening, the doorbell rang and Hotch answered it to let Penelope and Dave in to the house. They greeted Hotch and then moved into the living room.

"Hi honey," Dave said, kissing her on the cheek.

"Hi Dave, hi Pen," Jane said with a forced cheerfulness.

"We brought the fixings for burgers and fries. I thought I would fire up the grill and we can eat outside tonight." Dave told her.

"No! Not in the backyard!" Jane said in a panicked voice.

'Nice job, asshole!' Dave thought to himself, 'Of course she's not going to want to eat out there; it's pretty much right where she was taken.'

"It's OK sweetie, we can eat inside." Penelope said soothingly, shooting Dave a glare.

Dave and Hotch retreated into the kitchen to prepare the food, while Garcia and Jane stayed in the living room.

"Is she sleeping at all? She looks like shit." Dave asked Hotch as he formed the burger patties.

"Barely, she keeps having nightmares and then refuses to go back to sleep afterwards. She's been really quiet today and that's actually scaring me more than her anger did last night. I'm hoping she's nearing that emotional break that Dr. Adams warned me about." Hotch had filled Dave and Penelope in about what Dr. Adams had told him at the hospital.

"I don't know what to tell you Hotch…she's lucky to have you." Dave told him.

"Yeah, well, she's lucky to have all of us…so tell me what's been going on at the BAU?" Hotch said, changing the subject.

**********

Dinner went fairly well, Jane was still somewhat quiet, but she ate most of the food on her plate and Pen and Dave filled in the silence.

"Dave had me check on those plastic surgeons you guys had discussed, apparently they are two of the best in the field. They aren't in Miami anymore, they moved to Los Angeles, Beverly Hills to be exact." Penelope told everyone.

"Wait, plastic surgeons in Miami? I thought we would stay here for the surgeries?" Jane asked, confused.

"Well…" Hotch hesitated.

"Out with it dad, why are we going across the country for me to get a nose job?" Jane asked.

"The insurance company has refused to pay for your plastic surgeries, they say they are elective procedures-"

"Elective?! Have they _seen_ me? Does this look _elective_ to you?!" She said, gesturing to her face.

"No, of course the surgeries aren't elective, but since the insurance company won't be dictating where we go for the procedures, we have more leeway to see the best doctors." Hotch explained.

"Wait, these surgeries are going to be expensive, how are we going to pay for them? I mean, I guess I can live with without having my branding fixed, but my nose…" Jane trailed off at the end, she _really _didn't want to see her branding every day, but she couldn't ask her father to spend so much money on her.

"Don't worry about the cost sweetie-" Hotch started to say.

"But dad-" Jane tried to interrupt.

"I _said _don't worry about the cost, Dave's paying for your surgeries." Hotch told her.

Jane's fork clattered to her plate as she turned to stare at Dave. Dave looked nonchalant as he took a bite of his burger, "Gotta spend the money somehow and I would rather it went towards helping you than to the ex-wives."

"Jeez Dave, thanks…I mean really, thanks…" Jane didn't know what to say, a simple thank you wasn't going to cut it for something this big.

"There's no need to thank me honey, this is what families do and the three of you are definitely a part of my family." Dave told her. Hearing this, Penelope got a little choked up realizing that she also considered everyone at the table her family, but it was nice to hear they thought the same thing.

"I'll call these guys tomorrow and we'll see if they can see us next week." Hotch said.

"When you get the dates, forward them to my publicist at my publisher's office, she can make all of the travel arrangements." Dave said.

After dinner, Jane asked if she could be excused to go back into the living room. The couch had become somewhat of a nest to her and she wanted to get back to the comfortable surroundings. Hotch excused her and told her they would bring dessert and they would all eat it there.

The three adults stayed in the kitchen and discussed Jane for a few minutes before grabbing the container of Rice Krispie Treats that Mary Ventner had made them. They made their way into the living room, with Hotch in the lead.

As they entered the room, they noticed that Jane was standing at the fireplace staring at a framed picture of herself that was on the mantle, the picture had been taken less than two months ago on the first day of school. Every year since kindergarten, Hotch took a picture of Jane as she left on the first day of school; it was one of their favorite traditions. He saw that she was tracing the outline of her face and body with her finger tip.

"Are you ok, sweetie?" He asked as he stood near the sofa.'

"I don't know who this is anymore," she said, looking at the picture of herself.

"What do you mean?" Hotch asked.

"You should have let me die," she said softly, still staring at the picture. She could feel the tenuous hold she had on her emotions begin to slip away.

"What?" He asked, not sure if he had heard her right. He glanced at Dave and Penelope and he could tell by the looks on their faces that he had in fact heard her correctly.

"You should have let me die." Jane said louder, still not looking at him.

"Sweetie-" Hotch began, still standing near the couch.

"NO! Your _sweetie _died in that basement! _Jane Hotchner_ died in that basement!" With that, Jane threw the picture to the floor and they all heard the glass shatter. "I don't know who this is anymore!" She yelled, motioning to her own body. "Everything that made me _me_ died in that basement! Jane Hotchner was an independent girl who knew exactly what she wanted out of life and she knew how to get it. Now I'm a shell of a person!" She yelled, tears coursing down her cheeks.

"Jane-" Hotch tried moving closer to her, he knew this was the beginning of her emotional breakdown, but she cut him off.

"No, don't come near me, I'm disgusting!" She shrieked.

"Jane, you're not disgusting-" Penelope tried this time.

Jane whipped her head around, "I _am_ disgusting! Look at me! I look like a freak! I am in constant pain and I don't even know my own body anymore!" Her voice was cut off by a sob, but she kept going. "He took _everything _from me! I have no confidence anymore, hell I couldn't even fight back against him. He took my independence and self confidence and do you know what he replaced them with? Fear!"

Dave was standing quietly in the corner, trying not to tear up. Penelope couldn't stop the tears from running down her cheeks, it was heartbreaking listening to Jane, but she knew the girl needed to let go, to lose it.

"I am afraid _all_ of the time! I want privacy, but I'm too afraid to be alone! I want to go outside and be normal, but I'm afraid that someone else will take me, that I will be subjected to something like this again, or something worse!" Jane was crying and yelling at the same time, "I'm even afraid of this house! I can't go into my own backyard, I'm terrified to sleep alone in my bedroom and every creek makes me jump. He took me from the one place that made me feel safe and now I can't even sleep here!"

Hotch felt his heart break as he watched and listened to his daughter lose it, but he couldn't comfort her, not yet, she needed to get it all out.

"Everyone treats me like I'm this fragile thing that will break if you aren't super nice to me, and you're right to treat me like that, I feel like I _could_ break at any second! I just want everything to go back to normal! I want to be me again, not this shell of a person who is afraid of her own shadow! Why can't it all be normal again? Why did this happen to me?!" Jane wailed. Hotch dashed over to her as her knees started to buckle. He gathered her in his arms and helped her over to the couch, where he sat her on his lap and held her.

"Can't you make it all better like when I was a little kid, dad? Please daddy, _please _make it all better. Please!" She begged.

"I'm trying to baby, believe me, if I could I would make it all better in a heartbeat." Hotch told her, his heart breaking; she only called him daddy when she was horribly scared and upset. The last time had been when Haley died.

"I know you are, but I just want everything to be normal again!" She wailed.

"Let it out, baby…it's OK to let it out." He said, tears in his own voice.

"It's _not_ OK, I have to keep control!" Jane said, wiping her face and trying to keep her emotions under control. "I'm a Hotchner and we don't _do _that! If I'm going to regain any part of my identity, I have to start with that. I have to get straight A's! I have to get into a good college! I have to be the track star! I have to be perfect in everything I do!"

'Jesus, is that really what she thinks? Have I really put that much pressure on her?' Hotch wondered as he held his daughter. He filed that bit of the outburst away for a future discussion. "You _don't _have to keep control! I think just about everyone in this room has lost it at some point in the last week and a half." He said, looking at Penelope and Dave and both of them nodded. "The only one who hasn't lost it yet is you, and you're the one who was kidnapped! You need to let your emotions out sweetie or they'll eat you up inside."

"Really, you've all lost it over this?" Jane asked, tearily. They all nodded. "But, I can't…"

The rest of her sentence was lost in a sea of tears as the damn holding back her emotions finally broke.

**********

_This will probably be my last posting to this story until after Christmas as I plan on posting some Christmas chapters to my other story, 'A Different Kind of Life.'_


	19. Chapter 19

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 19

* * *

Hotch awoke for the second time in as many days to find his daughter missing from the living room. He wasn't too worried this time though, as he assumed she was sitting outside on the porch swing again. As he made his way towards the kitchen he peered out the living room window and saw that he was right, Jane was out there, wrapped in a blanket and holding a steaming cup of coffee. He glanced at the clock and saw that it read eight-thirty. Hotch picked up the phone and called the psychiatrist that Dr. Adams recommended. The doctor recognized the name and he was able to get Jane in for an appointment at eleven o'clock. Having finished that, Hotch poured himself a cup of coffee and thought back to the previous night.

Jane had cried well into the night and it broke everyone's heart to hear her sobs. She finally cried herself to sleep at around ten o'clock and Hotch gently set her on the couch, covered her with the blanket and motioned for Dave and Penelope to join him in the kitchen. Once there, they discussed the night's events.

"I'm glad she finally let her emotions out, but that was the saddest thing I've ever seen," Penelope said shakily, with tears drying on her own face. Dave nodded in agreement.

"I know…I don't think I've ever seen her lose it like that, and that includes when Haley died." Hotch told them. "At least now that this has happened, I can get her into therapy. I'm going to call first thing in the morning and get her an appointment with the therapist that Dr. Adams recommended. Garcia, can you stay over tonight so you can help Jane shower and get dressed in the morning?"

"No problem Hotch, I just need to run home and get some stuff for tomorrow. I'll go into work when you take Jane to her appointment." Garcia told him.

"Thanks Penelope," Hotch said, gratefully. "Dave, can you stay in the living room while Garcia runs home? I need to jump in the shower, but I don't want to leave Jane alone in case she wakes up with a nightmare."

"That's fine Hotch, go do what you need to do, I'll stay with Jane." Dave told him.

While Hotch showered, Jane did have nightmares but they didn't wake her up, so when Hotch got back down to the living room she was still sleeping. Dave and Hotch talked until Garcia got back and then Dave left as he had to be at the BAU early the next morning. Once Garcia returned, she grabbed a blanket and took over one of the other easy chairs in the living room; there was no way she was leaving that room.

As it turned out, both Hotch's and Garcia's worries over Jane's nightmares were unfounded. She slept fitfully, but for the first time in a long time, she didn't wake up screaming, which was why Hotch didn't wake up until eight-thirty the next morning.

Assuming Penelope would be in the shower for a while longer, Hotch pulled out a frozen breakfast casserole that Sean made and put it in the oven. Then he poured himself a cup of coffee and again went outside to sit with his daughter.

When Hotch stepped out onto the porch, he saw that Jane was wiping tears off of her cheeks. It wasn't a loud crying like last night, the tears were just coursing silently down her cheeks. Hotch sat down next to her on the porch swing, not sure of what to do.

"I don't know what's wrong with me, I just can't seem to stop crying…sorry," she said, still wiping the tears away. It didn't help that when she cried, her nose got stuffy and since it was broken, it hurt to sniffle.

Hotch put his arm around her and drew her in towards his side. "You _never_ have to apologize for crying, Jane." Hotch said, somewhat sternly. They sat there like that for another few minutes before Hotch spoke again.

"I think it's time you talked to someone about this, don't you?" He asked her.

"No…I…I don't want to dad, I don't want to relive it," she told him, but she wasn't protesting therapy as forcefully as she had been.

"Sweetie, it would probably help you with your nightmares and all of these feelings you've been holding back." If she kept resisting Hotch knew he would force the issue, but he wanted to give her at least some input in the decision.

"Yeah, but…" Jane trailed off.

"But what?"

"What if she tells me I'm a lost cause? What if she tells me I'm damaged beyond repair?" She asked in a quavering voice.

Hotch squeezed her as tight as her broken ribs would allow him to. "You are _not_ damaged Jane, you just need some help getting back to where you were before all of this happened."

Jane thought for a minute. She knew this was important to her dad and she knew it might help her. "Ok, I'll go talk to a shrink."

"That's wonderful sweetie, you have an appointment at eleven." Hotch told her.

Jane pulled away from him and looked at him. "Well thanks for making me think I actually had a choice in this!" She said angrily. "Is there ever going to be a time in my life when you are not constantly making decisions for me and telling me what to do?!"

"You need help and Dr. Adams told me to call this therapist as soon as possible. I was looking out for you!" Hotch told her, amazed at how quickly her mood changed.

"Whatever." Jane said belligerently, settling back into the cushion of the porch swing. Hotch hesitantly put his arm around her again and was encouraged when she didn't pull away. They sat there for another few minutes before Hotch spoke again.

"Penelope is still here, she stayed the night. She's going to help you shower and get dressed, ok?"

"Ok. I should probably head in and start getting ready then," she said.

"I'll have breakfast waiting when you're done." Hotch told her.

**********

The drive to the psychologist's office was quiet, and now that they were in the waiting room of her office, Jane looked as though she was facing her own execution. At eleven o'clock on the dot, the office door opened and a women who looked to be in her early thirties stepped out.

"You must be Jane," she said, coming over to Jane and extending her hand. Jane shook it, impressed that the doctor didn't automatically go to her father first.

"I'm Karen Thomas and I hear you and I will be talking today." From anyone else, those words would have sounded condescending, but from Dr. Thomas the words were friendly and sincere. Jane felt herself starting to like the doctor and she let some of her guard down.

Dr. Thomas turned to Hotch, "You must be Jane's father."

"Aaron Hotchner, it's a pleasure to meet you." Hotch extended his hand for the doctor to shake. Like Jane, Hotch also liked this doctor.

It's nice to meet you too, Mr. Hotchner." Dr. Thomas said and then turned back to Jane. "Why don't we go into my office and leave your dad to read my outdated magazines, OK Jane?"

Jane nodded and followed the doctor into the office. Once the door was shut, Dr. Thomas directed Jane to a chair and sat down in one across from her. "So Jane, what brings you here?"

Jane just looked at her, "You mean you don't already know?"

"I know what Dr. Adams and your father have told me, but I want to know why you think you are here."

Jane sighed, "I'm here because two weeks ago a deranged psycho kidnapped me and used me as his personal punching bag. I'm here because my friends and family think I'm crazy because of it. I'm here because I can't sleep for more than two hours at a time before I feel his hands on me and hear his voice. I'm here because I know this has been bad for my dad as well and he wanted me to see you. I'm here because I want to be the person I was before this happened." Jane was almost afraid to look at the doctor for fear she would see the pity in her eyes that had become visible in the eyes of her friends and family. She finally looked at Dr. Thomas and was relieved when she saw none.

"Well that's a lot that's going on with you; maybe we should start talking about it." Dr. Thomas said.

**********

Almost an hour later Dr. Thomas' office door opened and she walked out with Jane. Jane looked as though she had been crying, but she also looked more relaxed than Hotch had seen her in a long time.

"Why don't you sit here while I talk to your dad, OK Jane?" Jane nodded and picked up one of the magazines.

Hotch followed Dr. Thomas into her office, hoping she would give him some insight into his daughter.

"You have a lovely daughter, Mr. Hotchner." Dr. Thomas said.

"Please, call me Aaron."

Dr. Thomas smiled, "Well Aaron, your daughter has been traumatized, but she is strong and brave and I think between the two of us, we can get her through this. I would like to see Jane twice a week for awhile and I would like to see you once a week. I would also like to see the both of you together for family counseling once a week."

"I understand needing to see Jane that often and the family counseling, but why do you want me to begin therapy?" Aaron asked.

"Because this didn't just happen to Jane, it happened to you too and from what Jane told me, you watched her ordeal live via camera. Can you honestly tell me that didn't affect you?"

Hotch sighed, "No, of course it affected me. It was my worst nightmare come true."

"I thought so. So are you in agreement with this schedule?" Dr. Thomas asked.

"I will do anything to help my daughter, so yes, I am in agreement with the schedule."

"Good. Do you have any questions for me?" Dr. Thomas asked him.

"Do you really think she can get through this?" Hotch asked, somewhat afraid of the answer.

"I do." Dr. Thomas said firmly. "I told Jane that she will never fully forget what happened, but eventually it will just be a blip on her life's radar."

Hotch exhaled. "You can't imagine how relieved I am to hear that, Dr. Thomas."

"Please, call me Karen. Let me ask you, how are you coping with this as a parent? I'm not talking about the guilt; I'm referring to your parenting skills. It must be hard setting boundaries and dealing with disciplinary issues with Jane."

Hotch nodded, "It is. Part of the problem is she's been so moody since this happened. I am amazed by the way she is quiet and reflective one minute and then angry as hell the next minute. She lashes out at anyone and everyone and I don't know what to do about it." He admitted.

"It _is_ going to be tough for you for awhile. It doesn't help that Jane is a seventeen year old girl; she's going to have mood swings just because of that, but then when you add in something like this, you get highly charged mood swings." Karen told him.

"So what do I do about it?" He asked.

"You are going to have to use your own judgment. You will need to let her have more leeway than you normally would, but if she really acts out, you are going to want to call her on it and remind her that that type of behavior is unacceptable. She needs some normalcy right now, so you need to be stern with her at times and understanding at others. You are going to want to choose what battles you fight." Karen told him.

"What about medication?"

"Right now, Jane doesn't want to try any and neither do I; she needs to feel what's going on with her emotions. If we repress those emotions, she will push them down and she might never get over this. As hard as it might be, you need to let her emotions run their course." Karen said.

Hotch sighed, "Again, anything that will help her heal, I am willing to try."

"Good." Karen said as she got up from the chair to call Jane back into the office. She let Jane know that she would be seeing her both separately and with her dad for family therapy. Jane was surprised that her dad agreed to counseling.

"Now Jane, if you could wish for one thing to happen this week in your recovery, what would it be?"

Jane didn't have to think, "I want to be in charge of my pain medicine, I am tired of dad and Penelope constantly making me take my pain pills. They make me feel all loopy and disconnected. The feeling was nice at first, but I know now that I need to feel things in order to get past this."

"But Jane, you said last night that you are in constant pain. Why stop taking the pills if they help with that pain?" Hotch asked her.

"Because the pain pills don't work. I still have pain with them; I'm just removed from it. I'm not saying I'll stop taking the medicine all together; I just want to be the one deciding if I'm in enough pain to take it. I want to see if ibuprofen or Tylenol will help the pain."

Hotch considered Jane's request for a minute, "Ok sweetie, you can be in charge of your pain pills, although if I see that you're in a lot of pain I will still try and convince you to take one, but I won't force you."

"Does that work for you, Jane?" Karen asked.

Jane nodded, "It does."

"Good," Karen said with a smile. "Aaron, if there was one thing you wish Jane would do what would it be."

"I wish she would ask for help more, it's like pulling teeth to help Jane, she insists on doing everything on her own." Hotch turned to talk to Jane. "I know you have always been independent and you will be again, but right now you can't do everything on your own and I would love it if you would start asking for help instead of making me force help upon you."

Jane considered this for a minute; she knew that her dad came through for her with the pain medicine so she needed to come through for him. Plus, she had realized over the past few days that she really _did_ need help with many things, but she wasn't sure how to ask for it, so this could be a win for both of them. "Ok dad, I won't fight so hard to keep my independence; I'll try to be better at asking for help."

Karen smiled, "Great! Ok, well I think our sessions are over with for today, but I'll see both of you back here in two days."

**********

Jane's promise to ask for help was put to the test in the parking lot. She and Hotch were in the SUV and Jane was having problems getting her seatbelt on; it was too hard to reach with her broken ribs.

"Um, dad? Can you help me buckle my seatbelt? I can't reach that far."

"Sure thing sweetie." Hotch said as he reached across Jane and pulled her seatbelt into the latch.

"Thanks dad." Jane said softly.

"No problem." Hotch answered.

"No…I mean thanks for bringing me here today. You were right; I really do need to talk with someone about this," she said, softly.

Hotch knew that it took a lot for his daughter to admit that. "Again, no problem sweetie." He said with tears in his eyes. After a minute, he started the SUV and they made their way home.

**********

_Wow, so it's been almost a month since my last update…sorry about that. I thought that I would get a TON of writing done over Christmas break, but with visiting my family and work and various school related issues, my muse also decided to take a break. It's back now and even though I am starting an overwhelmingly busy semester, I am going to try to post more regularly. _

_I took many liberties with the psychological aspect of this story…I have no idea what they would talk about or how many times a week they would meet so I made it up. Sorry if I'm way off on that one._

_In the next few days I'll be posting another multi-chapter story. I know I have no business starting another story right now, but the muse wants what the muse wants and I'm afraid if I don't write this story, my muse will take another vacation. The new story will be a Rossi/JJ story and it will be my first attempt at a pairing so be gentle._


	20. Chapter 20

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

Every 40 Seconds-Chapter 20

* * *

The next two days were fairly uneventful for Jane and Hotch. They stuck to their morning routine of sitting out on the porch swing, coming back in and eating breakfast and then watching TV. They still were not sleeping in their respective bedrooms, as Jane was still too frightened to be alone in the house, but Jane's nightmares had gotten a little better, so they were both able to get some sleep in the living room.

While her nightmares had improved, Jane was still experiencing them on a nightly basis; she just did not wake up screaming anymore. Hotch thought it was because they were getting better, less vivid, but Jane knew that she was simply getting used to them. Along with the improvement of her nightmares, Jane's physical injuries had also healed a bit more. The swelling and bruising in her face was almost gone and, except for her nose, her face looked pretty much like it had before the kidnapping. The injuries to the other parts of her body were getting better as well; on Friday morning, Jane was able to get undressed and dressed by herself for the first time since coming home. She almost danced a jig over it!

While the appearance of her injuries had improved, she was still in a lot of pain. Now that she was in charge of her own pain medicine, she mostly took ibuprofen during the day and then her prescription pain medicine at night, since the pain tended to be worse then. Penelope still tried bullying her into taking her pain medicine during the day, but so far, Jane had been able to fend her off. Along with the pain, Jane's dizziness from her concussion had actually gotten somewhat worse. When she first arrived home, the dizziness usually hit her after she had been walking around for a while or after she got out of the shower, but now she sometimes felt dizzy even when she was laying down. On Friday morning, Hotch called Dr. Adams to tell her about it and she reassured him that it was normal for some increased dizziness since Jane was moving around more at home than she did at the hospital. She told him to wait and see if it got better over the weekend and if it didn't, he was to bring Jane back to the hospital to see her. Hotch was somewhat reassured after talking to Dr. Adams, but he vowed to watch Jane like a hawk over the weekend.

It wouldn't be too hard for Hotch to monitor Jane over the weekend, since he would have at least two other people to help him. On Thursday, Dave came to their place for dinner and invited the two of them and Garcia to his cabin for the weekend. He thought some fresh air and a change of scenery would do both Jane and Hotch some good and he hoped they would both relax better at his place. He also invited the entire team, including Erin Strauss, to the cabin for dinner on Friday night. He knew the team had been affected by Jane's kidnapping and it was their last weekend on stand down, on Monday they would be back in the regular case rotation again. He knew they needed to see that Jane was doing better and they needed a chance to blow off steam. During their family session with Dr. Thomas on Friday, Hotch mentioned the weekend invite and Dr. Thomas thought it was a great idea, so as soon as they got home; the Hotchners began packing their bags for the weekend. Jane packed as well as she could, but about ten minutes into it, she needed her dad's help.

"Dad?" She called from her bedroom.

Hotch appeared at the door, "What is it, sweetie?"

"Can you grab the jeans from the top shelf in my closet, please?"

Hotch stepped into her messy closet, grabbed the jeans and looked at them, "Aren't these pretty old? I thought you had outgrown these."

Jane nodded, "I did, but with all of the weight I've lost, my regular jeans don't fit me, so I'm hoping these will."

Hotch made a mental note to put more food on her plate during meals. She had been almost too thin before her kidnapping; he didn't even want to know what she weighed now. "Be sure to pack a swimsuit."

Jane looked confused, "Swimsuit? Dave doesn't have a pool."

"No, but he has a Jacuzzi tub in his master bathroom that he wants you to use. When I talked to Dr. Adams this morning, I asked her about it and she thought the Jacuzzi was a great idea. She thinks it might loosen up some of your injured muscles. If anything, it should help you with some of your pain."

"OK, I get that part of it," Jane said, still confused, "but why do I need a swimsuit?"

"For two reasons," Hotch explained, "First, I'm not leaving you alone in a deep bathtub filled with water. I want someone in there with you in case you get dizzy and pass out or fall asleep." Jane nodded, that made sense. "Second, we both know you get dizzy after you shower, so I can only imagine what a Jacuzzi bath will do to you. You may need either Dave or I to lift you out of the tub and I imagine you would rather be in a bathing suit if that were to happen."

Once again, Jane nodded, "OK, can you get it for me?" She asked from where she sat on her bed, "It's in the second dresser drawer."

Hotch looked around for a minute and then pulled out her bikini, "You know that I hate this thing, right?"

Jane smiled, a bit ruefully. "I don't think you have to worry about me wearing it for much longer, dad. With all of the scars I'm going to have, I think I will get a nice one piece suit from circa 1925 for next summer."

Hotch snorted, "As much as I would love that, you do realize that by next summer your wounds will be healed, right? Whatever doesn't heal on its own, we'll have the plastic surgeons fix."

With a sigh, Jane said, "I know dad, I'm just not looking forward to the surgery and more pain." She thought for a minute and then shook the idea out of her head. "Should we head out?"

Hotch nodded, "Dave told us to be there by five, and it's four o'clock now." With that, Hotch grabbed the two duffel bags and walked down the hallway with Jane. Once they reached the top of the stairs, Hotch put his arm around Jane and helped her down the stairway. He wanted to carry her, as her dizziness still made him nervous, but she had put her foot down her second day home. As a result, she leaned heavily on him as they made their way to the first floor and out the front door.

Jane waited by the SUV while Hotch put their bags in the back. As she was standing there, Melody approached her from the other side of the street.

"Hey," she said.

"Hey," Jane replied. The two of them hadn't spoken since Jane's outburst on Monday.

They both stood in silence for a moment while Hotch ran back inside for bottles of water for him and Jane.

"Mel, I'm sorry for what I said to you. You didn't deserve it; I was just being a bitch." Jane said.

Mel grinned, "Yeah, well, I'm used to it." Jane looked up and smiled at her. "Seriously Jane, after all you've been through, you have the right to lose your temper sometimes. I learned long ago not take half of what you say personally."

Jane was still smiling, "Like you should talk! Have you ever heard half of the things that come out of your mouth?"

They both hugged for a minute. After they pulled apart, Jane said, "So tell me what's been going on at school. I am _so _out of the gossip loop!"

"Right now all anyone can talk about is your visit yesterday." Jane groaned, she and her dad had gone to her school to meet with her teachers yesterday. They had hoped to get to the conference room before the last bell rang, but they had gotten there late and were in the middle of one of the main hallways when classes got out. As a result, Jane had been besieged with well wishers. It had been overwhelming.

"Were they talking about how awful I looked?" She asked.

Melody snorted, "Yeah, right. You've reached superhero status at school. People want to grow up to _be_ you!"

"Yeah, well I would advise _against _that." Jane replied. Just then, Hotch appeared with the water. Mel and Jane said goodbye and Hotch helped her into the SUV. Soon they were on the highway towards Dave's cabin and Jane fell fast asleep.


End file.
